Thank Goodness It's Monday #305

COMMENCEMENT ADDRESSES

YOU WISH YOU HEARD

According to an unscientific poll conducted by Good.com for a recent article, most people don't remember who spoke at their graduation.

I certainly don’t.

I’m guessing that most other TGIM readers don’t either. (If you do, and your commencement speaker shared something memorable, please share it with the rest of us.)

Chances are – no matter who spoke – they rambled on about "good job" … "good luck" … and something about "the future."

While those expressions are nice, most of us can agree they’re overused and not memorable.

While it may be too late for you to have an engaging and unforgettable commencement speaker, Good.com also put together a list of the –

Top 10 Commencement Speakers

You Wish You'd Heard.

TGIM ACTION IDEA #1: Click through HERE and you can see and hear over an hour of “highlights” from the presentations of about half of the ten notables.  

TGIM ACTION IDEA #2: Or continue here for a distinctive quote from each one (compiled by Kristin Piombino of Ragan.com) to send you off today inspired to “commence” your week. 

1. Steve Jobs, Stanford University, 2005 

"Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart."  

2. Theodore Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss), Lake Forest College, 1977, from a 92-word poem – “My Uncle Terwilliger on the Art of Eating Popovers” -- he unveiled on the occasion.  

"And

as you partake of the world's bill of fare,

that's darned good advice to follow.

Do a lot of spitting out the hot air.

And be careful what you swallow."  

3. J.K. Rowling, Harvard University, 2008 

"…failure means a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged."  

4. Bono, University of Pennsylvania, 2004 

"So my question I suppose is: What's the big idea? What's your big idea? What are you willing to spend your moral capital, your intellectual capital, your cash, your sweat equity in pursuing outside of the walls of the University of Pennsylvania?"  

5. Wynton Marsalis, Northwestern University, 2009  

"Blues is survival music. Congratulations y'all. You have survived. And in this moment, perfect in both its accomplishment and its potential, we stand on the threshold of your liberation—and I suspect your parents' as well."  

6. Anderson Cooper, Tulane University, 2010  

"…I realized that I don't need to give you advice, I don't need to try and teach you a lesson. The truth is, your class has taught me a lesson. You're the class that came after Katrina … A lot of folks probably said you were nuts to commit to New Orleans … But you came anyway. You took a chance. You made a tough choice, but look at you now, look at what you've accomplished not just for yourselves, but for New Orleans."  

7. Will Ferrell, Harvard University, 2003  

"Graduates, if you will indulge me for a moment, let me paint a picture of what it's like out there … You're about to enter a world filled with hypocrisy and doublespeak, a world in which your limo to the airport is often a half-hour late. In addition to not even being a limo at all; often times it's a Lincoln Towncar."  

8. Ursula K. Le Guin, Bryn Mawr College, 1986  

"Our schools and colleges, institutions of the patriarchy, generally teach us to listen to people in power … and so they teach us not to listen to … what the powerless say, poor men, women, children: not to hear that as valid discourse. I am trying to unlearn these lessons, along with other lessons I was taught by my society, particularly lessons concerning the minds, work, works, and being of women."  

9. Jon Stewart, College of William and Mary, 2004 

"Let's talk about the real world for a moment … I wanted to bring this up to you earlier about the real world, and this is as good a time as any. I don't really know how to put this, so I'll be blunt. We broke it. Please don't be mad … But here's the good news. You fix this thing, you're the next greatest generation, people."  

10. David Foster Wallace, Kenyon College, 2005 

"The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able to truly care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day." 

What would you share with the Class of 2011?  

TGIM ACTION IDEA: While I imagine it’s unlikely you or I will be invited back to our alma mater(s) to share our hard-acquired, real-world insights, our increasingly connected digital world gives us the opportunity to do just that with our “friends” and the folks we’re linked to. 

Last year at about this time I set out my thoughts on how such a speech ought to go in TGIM #261. (See it reposted below. Or HERE.)  I’d be interested to know your thoughts along the same lines.  

TGIM IDEA IN ACTION: Writing focuses your thinking. Why don’t you post up – either in your own space, on your Facebook, LinkedIn or similar page – what you’d say. Or respond to by e-mail or in the blog reply space provided. 

TGIM Takeaway: Even if you’re the only person you inspire, that would make a bigger impact than that graduation speaker you don’t remember, wouldn’t it?

“And, in conclusion” (wild applause) “I’d like to say …”

Geoff Steck
Chief Catalyst
Alexander Publishing & Marketing

8 Depot Square

Englewood, NJ 07631
201-569-5373

tgimguy@gmail.com 

P.S.  “Education: That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding.” Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.” Author Ambrose Bierce (1842 – 1914) conjured up that definition in The Devil’s Dictionary.