How it all began

Some kids grow up wanting to be a firefighter, doctor, or police officer; but not for Burnsville, NC cowboy, Garrett "Cowpaty" Wilson. I grew up always knowing that I wanted to be a rodeo clown and entertain audiences.

Growing up in a rodeo family, my dad competed in rodeo in his younger days competing in the bareback riding. By the time I was born he had hung it up and while I was growing up we would attend rodeo as spectators usually at the annual rodeos held at Western North Carolina Agricultural Center. At a young age I began drawing interest into the rodeo clown and listening to the jokes they would tell and watching the comedy acts they would perform. When I returned home from the rodeo I would start imitating the things that I saw the rodeo clown do.

On September 22, 2004; at the age of 6 years old a horrific event occurred that could have had a terrible outcome but instead has turned out to be a life changing event. I had a wreck on a 4-wheeler suffering a traumatic brain injury, while riding the 4-wheeler I had hit something in my path resulting in it flipping and landing on me. I was airlifted to Mission Hospital, immediately put on life support and placed in ICU, with the doctors having little faith in me surviving through the night, where I remained on life support for the next 13 days and in a coma until October 15th when I was admitted to Charlotte Health & Rehabilitation Center. There I started my road to recovery. Receiving physical, occupational and speech therapy daily and started walking, talking and eating again and started becoming my old self again and then came home on December 1, 2004.

It was a bad experience for my family and me during this time but now I'm doing great, living life to the fullest every day. I have no complications from the wreck. My life is great, I have a supporting family & friends, a great career, and most of all I'm living my childhood dream as a professional rodeo clown. God has truly blessed me in my life. These 24 years of my life have been great and the last 18 since my wreck have been even better. All of us in this walk of life takes the little things that we have in our life’s for granted, but should be seen as a blessing and thanked God for daily because it could be taken away in a flash, at any minute just like my life almost was and that's what I hope someone gets out of this, appreciate everything you have because it could be taken away in at any second. Ever since I got out of the hospital on December 1st everything I've done and experienced I've always tried to do with a smile on my face, as we all should. Those things and experiences might not have happened if it wasn’t for what I do in my life. While looking back on my life and wreck a couple years ago, I came up with a motto, which is: "no matter what your obstacles are in life always follow your dreams" ever since I've had my wreck that's what I've done and my dream has been at full blast for 12 years now traveling to 40+ rodeos a year all throughout the Southeast and into the Northeast!

While creating this message, I couldn’t help but think of two bible verses that help me through every day and are so fitting for this post. Joshua 1:9 “Always be strong and full of courage, for thy God is with thee wherever thy goes”. And Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ which strengthen me”. Without that and without God being with me through my whole life I sure wouldn’t be who and where I am today and I couldn’t have accomplished all the things that I have in my life without Him and I couldn’t be more appreciative of that. This walk of life is hard and is always going to be filled with troubles, trials, haters, doubters, people that come and people that go and is always going to be questionable and it’ll make you feel like the worst person ever through those times but you always have to keep your head up, have faith and confidence in yourself and in God! People are going to walk in your life and people are going to walk out of your life but we can’t let that discourage us. But with the power of prayer, helps improve and change all these things. Prayer is a powerful thing, prayer changes things. There were so many prayers sent up for me during this time and I couldn't be more appreciative of that and more appreciative of the power of prayer, so don't forget to pray. Life is so short, we all need to love with all our heart, spread smiles and laughter as much as possible, and share kind words with one another as much as possible. There’s two very important days of your life: the day you were born and the day you figure out why.

Every one of us was installed with a gift at birth and it’s our duty to find that gift and put it to use as much as possible. That gift is meant to be used to hopefully inspire, help, and encourage others because that’s what God would want and to allow others to see God within us and to share his gospel with others. The gift of life is a beautiful thing; a second chance at it is unremarkable. But figuring out why you’re alive is just incredible. Don’t ever take the gift of life for granted. If you’re reading this and start to wonder and question yourself and what your gift is and if you’ve found your gift and if you're using your gift; don’t worry, you’ll find it. If God woke you up this morning and continues to wake you up each and every day. He’s not through with you, he has plans for you. You’ll stumble upon your gift on your walk of life. When you stumble across it you’ll stop and say “that was you God” and you’ll realize that’s your gift and that it was God’s plan all along!

Your life is your message to the world. The main focus of your life should be to make it count. You’re capable of more than you know. Don’t forget to take notice of how far you’ve come. Every day is a fresh beginning. Love and embrace each and every day. Life is too short to worry, to be unhappy, and to be doubtful but with confidence and faith in God and yourself, great outcomes are going to happen. God is great!!!

I post this every year on social media to share to my followers on the anniversary of my wreck as a reminder to myself of what I’ve been through, to never give up, and with hopes that someone who is going through a hard time in life and don’t know which way to turn reads this and it gives them some hope and inspiration to keep their head held high and pursue forward. Our goal each and every day should be to be a better version of the person we were the day before. Our vision each and every day should be getting one step closer to achieving our dreams. Our purpose each and every day should be to uplift and encourage others to allow them to reach their full potential and make them feel like they're somebody. Whether it’s by offering a helping hand, giving a kind word, or something as simple as a smile or a laugh, you can turn someone’s day around with the simplest gesture. If you’re sitting around pondering about life and thinking there’s got to be more to life than this. There is so much more! This message was meant for you then.

That is the beginning of Cowpaty the Rodeo Clown to the present!

Thank you for stopping by!