If I'd Known Then What I Know Now: A Letter of Hope to Graduates

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Benjamin: Yes, sir.

Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?

Benjamin: Yes, I am.

Mr. McGuire: Plastics.

Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?

Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it.

            --from the 1967 film, "The Graduate"

Do you remember who spoke at your high school or college graduation? On that day, perhaps long ago, when you as a grad sat in a hard backed chair on a sun drenched football field or in a cavernous college field house or on ancient wooden pews in a church? Do you remember what advice was given to you? The pithy wisdom. Seemingly profound directions for life. How about the guidance a well meaning parent or relative offered?    

Admit it: you were probably having a hard time listening then.

Because you were nervous and excited at the scary and wonderful prospect of finally being on your own, fully responsible for your one God-given life.  You didn't listen fully because you were sad about leaving a group of friends or the comforts of home. You were worried because you'd yet to find a job. You just wanted the formal rituals to end so you could party! You were ready to toss your mortar cap into the air and then get on with things.

I know I was distracted on the day I picked up my diploma from the University of Massachusetts thirty five springs ago. I felt as if all the ways I had identified myself up until that point in my 22 years--student, dependent child, dreamer--these were being stripped away. Now it was up to me to figure out who I wanted to be and what the quality of my one life would be, as well. How I would choose to live as I made my way into the big unknown world.

Looking back I do know what I wish someone had said to me. 

"John: this life is not all about 'you'. Make your life about something bigger than self alone. Devote part of your life to a cause or a passion or an ideal or an eternal belief that makes the lives of others and this world better."     

I don't know if I would have heeded that advice. But I do know that I have been happiest in my one life of nearly six decades now, when I have given myself fully over to something other than "me".  To a faith in God.  To a cause for the good.  To service for others who are struggling.  To being a loving and caring adult in the life of a child: as Godfather and Uncle and teacher and friend.

I wish someone had warned me that if a person lives a self-focused, self-centered, self-indulgent life, makes one's self the center of the universe, that's a pretty lonely way to live. I wish someone had challenged me to see physical pleasure, indulging my outsized  appetites, as okay in the short term but ultimately fleeting, even shallow in the long run. 

I wish someone had taught me that it is not about, "Who dies with the most toys wins."  The most joyful moments I've known have never been about money or things or stuff. It's always been about relationships: who I love, who loves me. I wish someone had talked to me about being humble, that to do so doesn't mean thinking less of yourself but thinking less about yourself. 

The gift of being young and just beginning life's journey is that you get to figure it all out as you go along.  So perhaps this idea of my present self giving my past self advice is a bit fantastical.  But still: I do wish someone had shared with me one simple insight I've come to understand through the rough and tumble and beautiful and broken process of growing up.

A life lived for self alone is finally, not much of a life. A life lived for others is the best and the most blessed life of all.

God bless the class of 2018.