(Credit: Joe Angeles/WUSTL Photos)
Good morning! Thank you to everyone who was able to make it here today. I know that many people have traveled very far distances, even internationally, to make this a very special event.
I’ve thought a lot about what I would say here today. I could talk about how people say ‘we are the future’ and that ‘the world is our oyster,’ whatever that means, and we can do anything we set out to. I could have made some analogy between choosing your major and choosing what to get at Chipotle. (Pro tip: guac is always worth the $1.80 extra.) I even thought about making a speech about how clichéd graduation speeches are, but realized talking about how clichéd graduation speeches are is in fact a total cliché.
It was a struggle to come up with something to say, because honestly why should I be giving any advice? I have no idea what I want to do with my life and have no idea where I am going to be in five months, let alone five years. I struggled because I wanted to say something that was helpful or meaningful, that people would remember, and then I recalled something that I once heard.
‘Endings are never easy.’ We build them up so much in our heads, but they can never meet our expectations, and we often end up disappointed. I guess it’s because we all want to believe what we do is very important, that people hang on to our every word, that they care what we think. The truth is, you should consider yourself lucky if even occasionally you get to make someone – anyone – feel a little bit better. After that, it’s all about the people that you’ve let into your life. Family, professors, lost loves, and even those who have left us, and even though it feels warm and safe, it has to end.
College is this weird time that people say that you will expand your mind, learn things that you never would have thought of, and even find your passions. The problem is that most of that learning isn’t in the classroom. It’s not about the thesis that you wrote, the sculpture that you built, or the case analysis you prepared.
The reason why this is so special is because of the people that you let into your life. The 2 a.m. chicken waffle binges, staying up late just to talk a little longer, that special someone that you made out with freshman year but then never talked to ever again because it was too embarrassing, these are the experiences that stick with us. We want so desperately to believe that our time here meant something, that what we did here mattered. It is really only about the people that we met along the way that shared in our experiences that make it so important. The people that made us feel a little bit better that day.
Life has an interesting way of working out. After an infinitesimal amount of choices that started long before we were even born, we have all ended up here, at this time, in this place, all to get a piece of paper that says that we are smart.
Is that what this was all about? Was it all for a degree that will sit on a bookcase or in a frame in an office? This was supposed to be the best four years of our lives! And yet, I leave here unsure if that is what happened, unsure of what has happened. Too many nights that I don’t remember, maybe. The late nights in Whispers just blur together. It just seems surreal that we are done and now “life” starts. What was the last four years? Was I not living? Why so many rhetorical questions? I thought I was supposed to know everything by the time I leave college. Yet, here we are, at the end, with more questions than we started with.
But if there is one thing college did teach us, it was to be OK with being uncomfortable, to be OK with the unknown. There will be times that you don’t know what the next step is, you won’t know where you should go. Friends have told me that my 20s will be filled with doubt, second-guessing, and confusion … and that is OK. ‘Why?’ I would ask. Their response: Because you’re ready, and it’s time.
You should never dwell in the past for too long, as for the future it can be whatever you make it. There will be spreadsheets, reports, or design deadlines in the future, which all sounds vaguely similar to freshman year. You will be pushed to grow and learn in ways that you never thought possible, which sounds vaguely similar to freshman year. You will thrive and learn what you love like you never have before, which sounds vaguely similar to freshman year. Really, it’s like you’re starting college all over again, just without the tuition.
So it’s OK if you have questions, or that you’re scared. I’m pretty sure we all are. But we have done this before. And after four years, it’s not about the spreadsheets, presentations or design deadlines.
It’s about the people. That’s what makes the experience worth having. That’s what makes life worth living. Congratulations Class of 2014, let’s go make one more memory.