It is that time of year again when very important people are invited to share their thoughts on how they became important with the latest class of graduating seniors. I am not a very important person nor was I invited to share my thoughts on success with any graduating class. Lacking any such credentials I took the next best opportunity to share in the pomp and circumstance by participating in a letter writing assigment for my daughter's AP Lit class. Her teacher asked parents to write some words of wisdom for our soon to be graduating senior. (One of the last times I posted here was to do the same for her older brother so expect this to be a semi-annual thing - at least until my kids all graduate)
Dear Gillian,
Dear Gillian,
One of the unfortunate
situations with being the second child is the often “not so novel the
second time around” projects to which teachers ask parents to
contribute. This is one such
situation. Two years ago your brother
took the same class and came home with the same assignment. Merely brushing off that letter to your
brother and resubmitting it is unfair to you, who are as unique as he is and
deserving of equally unique advice from your parents.
Art often
imitates life and as you are preparing for your milestone event your mother and
I find a kinship in Polonius who stood before his son, Laertes, as he prepared
to leave for college. He offered sage
advice to the boy and in Polonius’ spirit we offer wisdom to our brilliant and
enthusiastic daughter.
We know well how
anxious you are and how often you stress unnecessarily about all levels of
detail. There is something to be said
for seeking perfection. Attention to
detail is important to success but not at the risk of losing substance. A grammatically correct sentence is not the
same as a well written one. As you write your life’s story push the boundaries
of grammar. Take chances with colorful turns of phrases and dangle more than
your share of participles. Split the
infinitives!
Slow jam your
experiences and go off script. There will
be enough Teleprompters out there telling you how to say and do things. You
don’t need to always follow them.
Try to do what
you love because then all the work you put into it won’t feel like effort. It will feel like fun and it will come
naturally like water flows down a stream.
Don’t worry if things
start out rough and unsettled. A young
stream babbles and skips and pivots unexpectedly tripping over the rocks in its
path. Eventually though that young stream
settles down into a long winding river that is calm and sure of its way –
meandering along, enjoying its roll, confident in its destination.
If you keep
finding yourself lost, try looking for something different. Change your perspective. Sometimes when we
set out to find something we just keep coming back to the same wrong spot. Decide to look for something else and maybe
you just might stumble onto what you really wanted.
Please try to
relax. Breathe. Always walk. What’s the rush? It isn’t a race you are about to start. There is no discernible winner and the finish
line is different for everyone. There
are no judges and those who will judge you are usually those least qualified to
do so.
Remember, there
is no need to stand when you can sit.
And to that point, there is no need to sit when you can lie down. Resting is important to your health, your
happiness and your beauty.
Your beauty
can’t be found in a bottle. Advertisers
spend a fortune promising beauty. You
already possess it. You radiate it
through your intelligence, through your attitude, through your kindness and
compassion, through your sense of purpose, and through your humor.
Remember to
floss regularly. It is important to take
care of your teeth. We paid a lot for that beautiful smile and it lights up a
room when you let it out. So let it out
often. Nothing opens doors faster than a
smile.
Laugh as much as
you can every day. Laugh at silly
things. Laugh at obscure things. When you find humor in difficult passages you
have already found your way out of them.
Sometimes everyone will laugh with you. Sometimes no one will. Occasionally just one person will. That person might be someone you want to get
to know better - or they are bat shit crazy.
It may be hard to tell at times. Some people are here only to serve as a
warning to others. Heed those warnings.
Take risks. No one who ever saw the whole world saw it from
a window unless she was an astronaut but then she had to take the risk of
getting up there to see it. Take note
though, before you attempt to beat the odds, be sure you can survive the odds
beating you.
The law of
diminishing returns applies to everything.
A $10 bottle of wine may taste pretty good until you try a $100
bottle. But does that wine really taste
10 times better? How would you know
unless you then try $1000 bottle of wine?
At some point there really is no distinction left to make. Never recognizing when you have it good can
lead to a lifetime of dissatisfaction.
Appreciate what
you have when you have it, but don’t close your eyes to what else may yet come
along. You can look forward to the
future while still enjoying the present.
If done right, when you look back you will find you are exactly where
you had hoped you would be.
Remember wherever you are there was once somewhere you came from that you can always go back to - your family.
Always love
your Mom and Dad.
Remember wherever you are there was once somewhere you came from that you can always go back to - your family.
Always love
your Mom and Dad.
