Commencement Address

, , , ,

Stephen Colbert’s 2011 Commencement Speech at Northwestern University

Here is Stephen Colbert’s 2011 Commencement Speech from just a few days ago. He gave this speech at Northwestern University. 

It is insightful and funny. Here are a few of his takeaway lines:

“Thankfully, dreams can change. If we’d all stuck with our first dream, the world would be overrun with cowboys and princesses. So whatever your dream is right now, if you don’t achieve it, you haven’t failed, and you’re not some loser….”

“Life is an improvisation. You have no idea what’s going to happen next and you are mostly just yanking ideas out of your ass as you go along. And like improv, you cannot win your life…..In my experience, you will truly serve only what you love. Because service is love made visible. If you love friends, you will serve your friends. If you love community, you will serve your community. If you love money, you will serve your money. And if you love only yourself, you will serve only yourself, and you will have only yourself….Instead, try to love others, and serve others and hopefully find those who will love and serve you in return.”

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6tiaooiIo0]

Other great commencement speeches:

President Obama: Arizona state commencement address

Nice speech: Randy Pausch inspires graduates

Marissa Mayer’s IIT commencement address

J.K. Rowling speaks at Harvard in her commencement address about the benefits of failure

, , ,

Nice Speech: Randy Pausch Inspires Graduates

Professor Randy Pausch made a surprise return to Carnegie Mellon University to deliver an inspirational speech to the Class of 2008 at the Commencement ceremony on May 18, 2008.

Pausch was included in TIME Magazine’s 2008 list of the world’s 100 most influential people. His book, “The Last Lecture,” co-written by Jeff Zaslow of the Wall Street Journal and based on Pausch’s now-famous talk “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams,” is a New York Times #1 bestseller.

For more on Randy, visit: http://www.cmu.edu/randyslecture

, , , , ,

J.K. Rowling Speaks at Harvard in her Commencement Address about the Benefits of Failure

Interesting speech by J.K. Rowling, author of the best-selling Harry Potter books, about the benefits of failure and the importance of imagination. This was her Commencement Address at the Annual Meeting of the Harvard Alumni Association in 2008.

Here are two excerpts which I like:

The first one is about a humble attitude towards life and achievements: “…personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement. Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two. Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone’s total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.”

In the end J.K.Rowling appeals to the Harvard graduates to think and help the powerless: “If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped change. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.”

There is also a transcript of the whole speech “The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination“.

 

Back to top