Sitting in on The Last Lecture

Life doesn’t come with a manual but if you look carefully there are plenty of easy to follow lessons left by people who figured out how to do it well. I recently came across such a lesson in my family’s book collection titled, “The Last Lecture.” This real life story focuses on Randy Pausch, a Carnegie Mellon professor diagnosed with cancer who’s determined to leave an enduring legacy for his loved ones. He does this by giving a last lecture – an exercise where professors reflect on what’s important to them and share their last words as if they were dying tomorrow.

Randy uses the first few chapters to outline his life to date and the rationale behind giving a last lecture. At first it seems as if the story will just be a paper copy of his live performance. A few chapters in however the book jumps from its straightforward narrative and shifts focus to important life moments for Randy. Each mini story reveals a lesson the professor learned when encountering life challenges. At this point Randy begins to reveal smaller thoughts regarding daily life that are focused on a grand narrative. Like life the book is filled with many lessons that when combined come together to showcase a complete story.

Ultimately there are many lessons to take away from this book. Below are a few I found meaningful:

• Make opportunity – “…If you can find an opening, you can probably find a way to float through it.”
• Never give-up – “…Don’t believe in the no win scenario.”
• Default to positive – “The park is open until 8 PM.”
• Brick walls aren’t dead ends – “Brick walls are there for a reason. They give us a chance to show how badly we want something.”
• Function is greater than perfection – “Not everything in life needs to be fixed.”
• Create to-do lists – “You can always change your plans, but only if you have one.”
• Learn from failure – “Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted… Be the first penguin.”

“The Last Lecture” is a quick read with lots to teach. The title is deceptive in the fact that while it’s focused on Professor Pausch’s last lecture, it’s easily a whole quarter worth of knowledge crammed into 200 pages. It’s not required reading but the story is perfect for those looking to get a new perspective on life and its daily challenges.

Smooth Sailing

Life is full of varying degrees of chaos. From simple day-to-day problems like commuting, to more complex challenges such as paying down a massive amount of debt or figuring out how to say goodbye to a loved one. Problems arise from the shadows often to steal the spotlight and collect all of our available attention. While these moment are important and can be life changing, they are brief.

Reflecting back on my own life over the past year, I can recall a few storms or two that arose out of nowhere. Now being in a moment of relative calm, I can easily recall the events surrounding the storm but recognize it as only a fleeting memory. After all, things turned out for the best in the long run. When Fuzz left, I bunkered down and became more independent, meetings new friends and acquiring new skills. When I was laid off, I used my available resources to visit Kuala Lumpur for a vacation and networked to find a new job when I returned.

Storms as I’ve learned come as quickly as they leave. While it doesn’t feel this way during, hindsight reveals it was more of a fire drill than a catastrophe. Life is full of unexpected events. Embracing the chaos when it comes to your door and cherishing the calm before and after is the best way to live. After all, life is too short to constantly be hunkering down for the next big one.

The Pace of Change

Change as we all know it is ultimately unavoidable, but as I’ve come to learn during my recent job hunt, it doesn’t always come quickly.

After graduating from the University of Washington in June 2009, I expected big changes to occur in my life rapidly. I imagined the perfect post-college dream. I had it all planned out. I’d graduate. I’d get a fantastic job. I’d be important. I’d be successful. And most importantly of all, I’d have money. Life unfortunately had other plans for me.

I graduated but I didn’t find a job and I found myself occasionally strapped for cash do to the sporadic paid internship work that I did shortly after I finished school. The change that I sought didn’t come at the rapid pace that I was expecting. It came at a crawl.

At first this snail’s pace of change frustrated me but as it carried on for over a year, I began to quickly appreciate the smaller aspects of life that I would have missed if I had went speeding by. In my “spare time”, I volunteered with my national fraternity, dabbled in various industries, created a network of passionate working professionals, explored my city more frequently, and reconnected with friends that I had fallen out of touch with. All of these experiences and more helped me stop and enjoy the good things in life; it let me see that work isn’t life. No, it’s just a mere component among many others that make a happy existence.

Now as I approach the close of my unemployment, I can honestly say that if I could go back and change everything, I would leave it all the same. Change as I’ve learned is sometimes unexpected and develops on micro level that can’t be appreciated without time and the right perspective. After all, very few great things are put together in a mere day. Like a great story, life requires the right amount of build-up and suspense to make it interesting.

So yet another chapter of my life comes to a close. My prolonged post-graduate job search has concluded. I now eagerly look forward to the beginning of the next chapter of my life at Nyhus Communications and the start of my “adult life.” I’ve waited a long time to say this, “It’s time for work!”