Silicon Valley entrepreneur and CEO of medical technology company, CrowdOptic Jon Fisher delivered the 2018 commencement address to the graduating students of the University of San Francisco.
John Fisher’s 2018 University of San Francisco Commencement Speech Transcript:
In Idea Man: A Memoir by the Cofounder of Microsoft, Paul Allen describes the early fun days of discovering the personal computer, his love for programming at an early age, meeting Bill Gates at Lakeside private school, the origin story of Microsoft, the partnership dynamic between him and Bill.
Idea Man is a great memoir about innovation, vision, partnerships, sacrifice, compromise, conviction, consistency, and the power of self-belief. A lot of lessons were learned from pioneering the computer revolution, seizing opportunity, making bold moves, and executing relentlessly. Allen was diagnosed with lymphoma in 2009, leading to a renewed sense of urgency for life and sharing his story. Allen was vulnerable about his successes, failures, dealing with cancer, his thorny roller-coaster relationship with Bill Gates. Idea Man is a must-read for co-founding a tech company.
The Coronavirus has disrupted our lives and nothing would ever remain the same again. One of the unintended consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic is the lockdown giving us the opportunity to spend time with ourselves, self-reflect and forced reset of our lives. The lockdown has been one of the most transformative period of my entire life. It’s been a roller coaster of emotions, grief, anxiety, loss, relationship recalibration, self-assessment and constant improvement.
it’s been extremely tough to deal with the challenges and also exciting to have more time to self-reflect as a result of the downtime. During this challenging times, it was also an opportunity to form new habits, regimen, and routines. One of the surefire way of achieving any goal and avoiding overwhelm is to take it one step at a time. As Greek Philosopher Aristotle once quipped “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” Gaining momentum through daily small wins is the key to achieving any worthwhile goal.
Sooner or later, the great men turn out to be all alike. They never stop working. They never lose a minute. It is very depressing.
Success they say leaves clues and for creatives, one of the common themes is their daily routine. Author Mason Currey was fascinated by the routine and regimen of the most creative minds of our time. His curiosity led him to ask questions such as How do you do meaningful creative work while also earning a living? Is it better to devote yourself wholly to a project or to set aside a small portion of each day? And when there doesn’t seem to be enough time for all you hope to accomplish, must you give things up (sleep, income, a clean house), or can you learn to condense activities, to do more in less time, to “work smarter, not harder? Is finding a basic level of daily comfort a prerequisite for sustained creative work?
In The Power of the Other: The startling effect other people have on you, from the boardroom to the bedroom and beyond-and what to do about it, Psychologist and author Dr. Henry Cloud write about the power of association – the power that someone else, not you, has in your life of performance, achievement, and well-being.
“human performance requires fuel from relationship. But, the booster engine is not the rocket. The support is not the performance.”
There are no unrealistic goals, just unrealistic timelines.
It is that time of the year when we set new year resolutions, wishes, goals, expectations, re-order our priorities, change our routines, and pay more attention to our aspirational desires. A goal is a dream with a deadline, we all can achieve whatever we set our mind to achieve. Humans are the only animal that has that superpower to will anything they desire. We set goals at the beginning of the year such as exercising more, saving more, reading more books, nurturing our relationships, learning a new foreign language, the list goes on and on.
Whatever the mind can conceive and believe it can achieve – Napoleon Hill
By March, most of us begin to falter with our goals because the going usually gets tough, we got bills to pay, work deadlines to meet, children to raise, family responsibilities, etc. Most of us have the desire to achieve our goals but we have not developed the right strategies and techniques for achieving them. Here are 10 strategies that could help you in achieving your goals this year:
German Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once said, “He who has a strong enough why can bear almost anyhow.” It is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when. Whatever would go wrong would eventually go wrong (Murphy’s Law). When you are trying to achieve greatness, it is a roller coaster ride of ups and downs, the middle is usually messy, the trying times would always come. The key is to persist by remembering why you started in the first place.
The year was 2013 and I received the bad news of losing my closest cousin Aloma. I was shellshocked, devastated, and emotionally drained for a long time. During the early grief period, I saw an advert for an upcoming Marathon (Accra Milo Marathon 2013). The Marathon was three weeks away but I enrolled as I needed something to help with my mental health. I participated in my first Marathon as a result of grief and I finished around six hours plus. I ran, walked, crawled, limped, and eventually finished the race because of my Why (running for my deceased cousin). I since participated in 11 Marathons in 6 different cities (Accra, Cotonou, Lagos, Nairobi, Toronto, and Ottawa).
It is the same for any goal you have set for yourself this year, it is ok to falter once in while. Miss somedays, walk instead of running, crawl instead of speeding up, but don’t forget why you started in the first place. With a compelling WHY, you can deal with any obstacle that would come up eventually.
“He who has a strong enough why can bear almost anyhow.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
2. Start Small
Research shows that people are more likely to achieve a goal if it is subdivided into smaller goals. According to a 2017 study, Step by step: Sub-goals as a source of motivation by Szu-chiHuang et al – When individuals are initiating a goal and derive motivation primarily from the belief that the final goal state is attainable, the structure of sub-goals enhances the sense of attainability and therefore leads to greater motivation. Conversely, when people are completing a goal and the source of motivation centers primarily on the perception that their actions are of value, a focus on the overall goal (rather than sub-goals) heightens the perceived value of the goal-directed actions and leads to greater motivation. 1
“Behavior (B) happens when Motivation (M), Ability (A), and a Prompt (P) come together at the same moment.”
World-renowned Behavior Scientist at Stanford University and author of Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything, Dr. BJ Fogg makes a strong case for starting small and setting small achievable goals. He writes:
We live in an aspiration-driven culture that is rooted in instant gratification. We find it difficult to enact or even accept incremental progress. Which is exactly what you need to cultivate meaningful long-term change. People get frustrated and demoralized when things don’t happen quickly. It’s natural. It’s normal. But it’s another way we’re set up to fail.
One tiny action, one small bite, might feel insignificant at first, but it allows you to gain the momentum you need to ramp up to bigger challenges and faster progress. The next thing you know, you’ve eaten the whole whale. 2
“The essence of Tiny Habits is this: Take a behavior you want, make it tiny, find where it fits naturally in your life, and nurture its growth. If you want to create long-term change, it’s best to start small.”
3. Set SMART Goals
SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timebound. The SMART acronym outlines a strategy for achieving your goal. Your goals should be:
Instead of I want to read more book
SMART Goal: I read 100 books by December 31st, 2022
Experiments have shown that people with SMART goals are more likely to seize on the easiest tasks, become obsessed with finishing projects, and freeze on priorities once a goal has been set. “You get into this mindset where crossing things off your to-do list becomes more important than asking yourself if you’re doing the right things. 3
Living without clear goals is like driving in a thick fog. No matter how powerful or well-engineered your car, you drive slowly, hesitantly, making little progress on even the smoothest road. – Brian Tracy, Goals!: How to Get Everything You Want — Faster Than You Ever Thought by Brian Tracy.
4. Write down your goals
According to a study led by Professor Gail Matthews of Dominican University of California, people who wrote their goals accomplished significantly more than those who did not write their goals down. The study involved 267 participants recruited from businesses, organizations, and business
networking groups. Participants were divided into five groups: : Group 1- Unwritten
Goal; Group 2- Written Goal; Group 3- Written Goal & Action Commitments; Group 4-
Written Goal, Action Commitments to a Friend; Group 5- Written Goal, Action
Commitments & Progress Reports to a Friend.
At the end study, Matthews found that writing your goals down enhanced achieving it significantly. 4
“You will never change your life until you change something you do daily. The secret of your success is found in your daily routine.” – John C. Maxwell
5. Routinize your goals
As the Greek philosopher, Aristotle once quipped “We are what we repeatedly do, excellence then is not an act but a habit.” To increase the odds of achieving your goals this year, try to include your goals in your daily routine. For example, to listen to more audiobooks, you can listen to audiobooks when you are on the treadmill at the gym, when lifting weight or other activities like that. One of the best ways of achieving your goal is to include it as something you do on a regular basis. Read on your commute to work, listen to audiobooks in the gym, read a chapter before you sleep, listen to educational materials while driving, etc
“We are what we repeteadly do, excellence then is not an act but a habit.” – Aristotle
6. Prioritize your goals
I am often asked how I am able to read more than 100 books yearly, the answer is simple: Reading is a priority for me. I decided a long time ago to always strive to be a better version of myself daily by committing to lifelong learning. Hence my dedication to reading books daily, listening to audiobooks, listening to podcast among other activities. I challenge myself daily to read, think and relentlessly execute. A priority is something that is more important than other things and that needs to be done or dealt with first. Prioritization is the activity that arranges items or activities in order of importance relative to each other 5
If you don’t prioritize your goals, you would use your time on things that are less important. As German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once remarked “Things that matter most must never be at the mercy of things that matter least.” If you don’t prioritize your time, you would fall inside someone else’s priority.
“I have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.” – Dwight D. Eisenhower
7. Set Constraints such as Public Pressure/Accountability Partners/Commitment contract
Setup constraints for achieving your goals such as having an accountability partner, writing about your goals online, and sharing for public pressure, use a commitment contract with online tools such as Stickk. A Commitment Contract is a binding agreement you sign with yourself to ensure that you follow through with your intentions—and it does this by utilizing the psychological power of loss aversion and accountability to drive behavior change. 6
One of the fastest ways to bring accountability to your life is to find an accountability partner. Accountability can come from a mentor, a peer, or, in its highest form, a coach. Whatever the case, it’s critical that you acquire an accountability relationship and give your partner license to lay out the honest truth. An accountability partner isn’t a cheerleader, although he can lift you up.
An accountability partner provides frank, objective feedback on your performance, creates an ongoing expectation for productive progress, and can provide critical brainstorming or even expertise when needed. As for me, a coach or a mentor is the best choice for an accountability partner. Although a peer or a friend can absolutely help you see things you may not see, ongoing accountability is best provided by someone to whom you agree to be truly accountable. When that’s the nature of the relationship, the best results occur. 7
An accountability partner will positively impact your productivity. They’ll keep you honest and on track. Just knowing they are waiting for your next progress report can spur you to better results. Ideally, a coach can “coach” you on how to maximize your performance over time. This is how the very best become the very best. – Gary Keller, The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results
8. Self Compassion
When the going gets tough like they often do, don’t beat yourself up for not achieving all your goals. Have compassion for yourself, be grateful for life, and always make sure you do your best. If you try to do your best most of the time, you would be fine eventually.
Everyone’s life is different, and we are all doing our best. “Our best” today may not be “the best there is,” but it’s the best we can do today. Which is strange. And yet true. And could draw us down into helplessness and isolation if we don’t stay anchored. And the way we stay anchored is with gratitude. 8
When we’re struggling, we may reach a point of oscillating between frustrated rage and helpless despair. Solution: Choose the right time to give up, which might be now or might be never; either way, the choice puts you back in the driver’s seat. – Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski Ph.D. & Amelia Nagoski DMA.
9. Setup Reminders
To achieve your goals this year, set up reminders such as using timers, alarm clock, goal timers, the Pomodoro Technique. The Pomodoro Technique is a time management method developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s. The technique uses a timer to break down work into intervals, traditionally 25 minutes in length, separated by short breaks. Each interval is known as a Pomodoro, from the Italian word for ‘tomato’, after the tomato-shaped kitchen timer that Cirillo used as a university student. 9
Setting reminders allows you to remember your goals, the reminder could be a picture of your goal, a frame, wallpaper, etc. The more you see and are reminded of your goals, the more probable you can achieve them.
10. Review your goals daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly.
By constantly reviewing your goals daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly, you increase your chances of achieving your goals. The more you can review your goals, the better. By reviewing your goals, you can impress your goals into your subconscious mind and with time, you would be on autopilot.
A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week. – General George S. Patton.
Achieving your goals and becoming great is not an easy task as we all find out yearly. it is not enough to set those lofty goals. You need to have a strategy for executing the goals. Anyone can set a goal of speaking a foreign language, what differentiates those that follow through and those that do not is persistence, consistency, and determination. Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.
All the Best in your quest to get Better. Don’t Settle: Live with Passion.
One of the ways that I try to stay sharp is by listening to my favorite podcasts such as The Tim Ferris Show, How I Built This with Guy Raz, Masters of Scale with Reid Hoffman, Lex Fridman Podcast among others. The podcast host interviews the brightest minds and thought leaders wherein they discuss their worldview, lesson learned, insights, recommend great books, thought processes, and navigating the roller coaster called life. – To be the best, learn from the best.
A podcast is an episodic series of digital audio files that a user can download to a personal device for easy listening.
Goal: Listen to 365 podcasts by December 31st, 2022.
Strategy: Listen to one podcast per day.
Cal Newport is one of my favorite productivity writer. He is the writer that has shaped my view the most about the constructive use of the internet and social media. His books Digital Minimalism, Deep Work, and a world without E-mail were very impactful, thought-provoking and they all made me make some drastic changes. I believe the worth of a great book is determined by the change in behavior and the action that you take after reading the book.
Some of the actions have taken after reading Cal Newport books include deactivating Facebook, deleting Twitter, deleting all posts on Linkedin, stopped using Instant Messengers (such as Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger, et al), Deactivating Instagram. I still check social media daily after work on my desktop to view my favorite comedy skits, Nigerian Musicians that inspire me, and some random stuff. What the insights from reading the Newport books have done for me, is that I am more mindful of how I use the internet, schedule my activities and use my free time to focus on things that matter to me such as personal growth and development, exercise, self-care, content creation et al.
When it comes to the arts, passion should always trump common sense.
American actor Robert De Niro delivered a frank, funny and thought-provoking speech to the 2015 graduating class of NYU Tisch School of the Arts. He spoke about the challenges of being an artist, the ups and downs, the roller coaster, what it takes and eventually the triumph.
We are producing data at a very fast speed than we can consume it. We are bombarded daily by a deluge of notifications, news, feeds, pings, instant messaging, tweets, shares, stories, advertising etc. According to Domo’s Data Never Sleeps 5.0 infographic: “Data is on overdrive. It’s being generated at break-neck pace, flooding out of the dozens of connected devices we use every day, and it shows no signs of slowing down.” 90% of all data today was created in the last two years – that’s 2.5 quintillion byte of data per day.
90% of all data today was created in the last two years – that’s 2.5 quintillion byte of data per day.
One of the overarching benefit of dealing with information overload that we all seem to face is the ability to fully concentrate on what really matters and not been distracted by all the sound bites on social media, instant messaging and the like. Various authors have written beautifully on the subject of concentration, use of social and becoming indistractable. Here are some insights shared by my favourite authors on the these subject Matter.
We are producing more data than we can process to information. We are constantly been bombarded with notifications, alerts, pings, news, reports, etc. Social Media is one of the greatest innovation in the past decade and it has amplified our tendency to keep up with peers, family and neighbours. Information Overload is one of the unintended consequence of been constantly available and online.
Here are 30 quotes on information overload
“Hard things are hard because there are no easy answers or recipes. They are hard because your emotions are at odds with your logic. They are hard because you don’t know the answer and you cannot ask for help without showing weakness.”
In The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers cofounder of Andreessen Horowitz, Ben Horowitz shares timeliness advice on building and running a startup. Ben tells the story of how his company Opsware went from doomed in the eyes of the world to a $1.6 billion outcome with no recapitalization. He shares war stories including several near bankruptcies, a stock price of $0.35 per share, unlimited bad press, and three separate layoffs where they lost a total of four hundred employees.
![Ben Horowitz: Nailing the Hard Things [Entire Talk]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/F2e3RqL4VWs/hqdefault.jpg)
Ben describes strategies for laying off employees and executives the right way, communicating effectively, demoting a loyal friend, lessons learned as a founder-ceo, managing the toughest problems and making the tough calls.
Ben shared the insights he’s gained developing, managing, selling, buying, investing in, and supervising technology companies. A lifelong rap fanatic, he amplifies business lessons with lyrics from his favorite songs, telling it straight about everything from firing friends to poaching competitors, cultivating and sustaining a CEO mentality to knowing the right time to cash in.
Actor, producer and screenwriter Charlie Day, a 1998 graduate of Merrimack College, delivered the keynote address at Merrimack’s 64th undergraduate commencement ceremony. Charlie is He is best known for playing Charlie Kelly on the sitcom It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (2005–present). The speech is funny, witty and very insightful.
Charlie Day’s Merrimack College Commencement Transcript
Good morning Merrimack.
Thank you, President Hopey, faculty, trustees, students, parents, grandparents who have absolutely no idea who I am.
And I love to say there is nothing more exhilarating than getting to follow a great speech by Ugandan refugee – a terrible position to be in but I’ll do my best. And well done, Kennedy.
You are graduating from an excellent school today. Alumni have gone on to be CEOs, politicians, professional athletes. However this year you’ll get to receive wisdom, life lessons, knowledge from a man who has made a living pretending to eat cat food.
Now I do however have some qualifications, some insight, because like you are becoming today, I am a Merrimack College Graduate.
Thank you.
I know what it took to get here today. I was in this very room. I sat in those uncomfortable chairs. I dressed like some sort of medieval pastry chef, and I too desperately hoped that my hangover would wear off. Yeah, that one knows. If you can just make it to brunch you should be alright.
Take note. A quick observation today.
Apparently the higher you climb in life the more ridiculous your hats will become. Like the one I’m wearing today, or the Pope or Pharrell. So in some way you fear success, just think of the hats, that should motivate you.
Well, this may be hard to believe but it was roughly 20 years ago that as a freshman I came to this campus. I remember it well. My parents who are here today and I am not thinking my mother as much as Kennedy, I am sorry.
But I remember the tears in their eyes. I remember my own nervous excitement. I can recall entering the Ash dormitory, walking to my room. My heart was pounding with what the future might hold. I grabbed on to the door handle, I held it tight, only to discover that someone had covered it with Vaseline.
It was a real lame prank by the third floor boys. And I thought to myself, “OK, this is how it’s going to be here. They have no idea who just arrived on campus.”
Later that day, I befriended a man named Ed who had a similar penchant for mischievousness. And that night Ed and I went to the third floor boys community bathrooms and we cut all their shower curtains at waist high.
Thank you. That’s right.
Leaving those boys with a diabolical option for the next morning. Don’t take a shower or take the most embarrassing shower of your life. My apologies to the school for the destruction of school property. I promise to donate two shower curtains. You’ll have to dig up Ed to get the third.
Well, Merrimack has come a long way since my time. The campus has grown. The quality of student clearly improved. U.S. News & World Report has ranked Merrimack as one of the top ten regional colleges in the northeast. Well done. Well done.
In my time there was a man here who scored in the zero percentile on his SATs. Meaning no one in the nation did worse than this man. This was a man who once told someone “he wished he lived when it was black and white.” This is the same man who said to someone with complete seriousness that “he would take their advice into cooperation.” This man, of course was my roommate.
Did you think it was me? No, you’re confusing me with my television character. No. I am much smarter. In fact, I’m a doctor now. I have a PHD. And I would like to thank the school for bestowing me with this prestigious honor.
And although I realize today I am joining the ranks of my fellow Honorary Doctors like Mike Tyson and Kermit The Frog, and although I acknowledge that Dr. Charlie Day sounds like some kind of club DJ. I assure you I intend to go by this title from now on. And I plan to begin writing my own prescriptions immediately.
All right. Now, I know that having a honorary doctorate degree will do nothing for me. But I’m here to tell you today that your degrees, the ones you toiled to get, the ones you actually took classes to earn, those degrees, will also basically do nothing.
Let me clarify that.
You can’t exchange your degree for cash. You can’t have your degree do an audition or interview for you. You cannot eat it. Please, do not make love to it. I think you could probably smoke it but I wouldn’t advise it.
A college degree does nothing. It collects dust. It does however mean something. It tells something to your community, it says “I have expanded my mind and destroyed my liver but I didn’t give up.”
And although 44 of you today took more than 4 years to accomplish that goal, you don’t have to tell anyone that.
Think of the plus side, you bought your parents a few extra years of nobody living in their basement.
Now all jokes aside, you should be very proud. This is an impressive chapter of your lives. And I know you are curious of what will happen from here. So let me tell you, Dr. DJ is here to help.
I have been in your shoes. Not literally of course. I wouldn’t go anywhere near your shoes. I’m sure they all reek of beer and vomit.
But my point is this. I was in this room and this is a rare opportunity for me to say something to myself 20 years ago.
Here is my advice: “Charlie, lay off the dark beer and the bread. You’re getting puffy. Don’t worry about that girl. I mean she’s not into you. Let her go. She’s going to regret it.” That’s right. “There is going to be a whole Y2k thing; don’t worry about it, like nothing’s going to happen.” All right.
Now I realize this isn’t the most useful exercise for you but I am pretty happy with the choices I made after Merrimack. My life is pretty sweet.
So I’d like to tell you three quick stories about some of those choices I made when I left here, some of the things that led me from that chair to this podium. And I hope in some way you can draw parallels from it; they can help guide your own experience. If not, feel free to tune out. If you’re anything like I was, I lost you at “Good morning Merrimack.”
When I left this school, I was presented with two options. I could move to New York City and begin my acting career, a city where I knew next to on one, or I could take the entry level position that had been offered to me by Fidelity Investments.
Now I know what you are thinking. “Why would a major financial services corporation offer this numbskull a job?” The answer is simple, because I tricked them.
Merrimack’s business program was offering interviews with the company. The students would be given a score on their interview. I had never been on an audition. It seemed like it would be a similar experience. And I liked the role of aspiring banker. Or whatever they do at Fidelity.
Now I know what you are thinking. “Why would a major financial services corporation offer this numbskull a job?” The answer is simple, because I tricked them.
Merrimack’s business program was offering interviews with the company. The students would be given a score on their interview. I had never been on an audition. It seemed like it would be a similar experience. And I liked the role of aspiring banker. Or whatever they do at Fidelity.
I had a game plan. Deflect from me. Get this guy to talk about himself. I wasn’t going to lie. I was just basically going to interview him. If I recall correctly we talked at length about the intricacies of water skiing, an activity I know nothing about.
Now had the man asked me what eight times seven was, there would have been an unbearable pause in the room. But he didn’t. And the interview went so well that they offered me a job. And this was a real job. I am sorry I am making your children cry.
This was a real job. This was a big boy job. And this threw me for a loop…”Should I take this job? Is this my destiny? Am I the next great financial genius? Should I come up with a plan B? Should I work in Boston for a few years and make enough money to have a cozy transition to New York?”
Well, I’ve always had a half baked philosophy that having plan B can muddy up your plan A. I didn’t take the job. I moved to the city. I bussed tables. I lived in a basement apartment next to a garbage chute that was filled with cockroaches. And I could not have made a better decision.
Well maybe not the apartment thing. I think I could have looked a little longer. You’ll find better apartments. Stay away from the trash area.
Now there is an obvious lesson here about believing in yourself, for the plan A, plan B stuff, excuse me while I navigate this thing.
But I think the lesson is this. Had I worked at Fidelity I’m sure they would have fired me eventually. I can barely do long division.
But I didn’t want to fail at Fidelity. And I did not want to fail in Boston. If I was going to run the risk of failure I wanted it to be in the place where I would be proud to fail, doing what I wanted to do.
And let me tell you something… I did fail over and over again. I was too short for this or too weird for that. I had one casting agent say “This main will never work in comedy.”
Now there is an obvious lesson here about believing in yourself, for the plan A, plan B stuff, excuse me while I navigate this thing.
But I think the lesson is this. Had I worked at Fidelity I’m sure they would have fired me eventually. I can barely do long division.
But I didn’t want to fail at Fidelity. And I did not want to fail in Boston. If I was going to run the risk of failure I wanted it to be in the place where I would be proud to fail, doing what I wanted to do.
And let me tell you something… I did fail over and over again. I was too short for this or too weird for that. I had one casting agent say “This main will never work in comedy.”
I had a sense that maybe I could create an opportunity that was better than the ones that were being given to me. So I borrowed cameras, I had friends hold microphones and we shot a show in our apartments that we were going to call “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.”
Thank you.
Now suddenly there was another decision to be made. Another crossroad. Do I do “Life on a Stick?” Do I take this big network television opportunity, or do I make another bet on myself and this time my friends as well? Do I make no money, do I try to sell a home movie as the next great television series?
I mean, I was trying to tell people I was a writer and I didn’t even own a personal computer. This was a risky bet, a real long shot. But I said no to “Life on a Stick” and I went with “Sunny.”
“Life on a Stick” went one season and thirteen episodes. We are currently filming our tenth season of “Sunny.” We’ve written and produced 114 episodes. We are signed on for another two years making “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” one of the longest running comedies of all time.
Thank you. Thank you.
Again a bet on myself and this time on my friend — you don’t want this. This will be better.
This time a bet on myself — That’s not better. A bet on my friends and self as well paid off. It paid off in spades. There was power in numbers. And “Sunny” changed my life.
Not only did I have a career as an actor and a writer now, I had complete control over everything I wanted to do. If I wanted to dress in a full body green spandex suit it went in the show.
If I wanted to drink coke, or wine from a coke can as perhaps some of you are doing it went in the show, and if I had a weird idea about putting mittens on kittens, it went in the show.
This was the riskier road but I could not have made a better decision. ‘Sunny’ changed my life and it led to everything: “Horrible Bosses,” “Pacific Rim,” “Saturday Night Live.”
Thank you.
Creating the job as opposed to waiting for it to be offered to me was the way to go. Now I think this is an obvious lesson here. Don’t wait for your break. Make your break. Go make it happen for yourself.
All right. One last story, then I am out of here.
The last story of what led me from there to here is the literal act of agreeing to be here today. When President Hopey came to sit down with me in Los Angeles my first thought was, “Here it comes, they’re going to ask me for money.” Yeah, they haven’t yet. Thank God.
But when he asked me to speak to you today, I happily accepted. And then as is the case with all great opportunities, the reality of what I had to do began to set in. “Dear God” – the kid’s still crying. People are laughing and the kid’s crying. I am worried about that one.
“Dear God”, I said to myself, “I’m going to have to actually give a speech.” I am not a public speaker. I have a voice like a ten year old who smokes. “How am I going to do this?”
I YouTubed commencement speeches given by Conan O’Brien, Steven Colbert, Steve Jobs. This was a terrible idea. Their speeches were so intelligent, so well informed and so eloquent that only more panic began to set in. “What am I thinking?” “How could I ever compare?”
And the truth is, I can’t. I don’t host a talk show or do stand up. As an actor normally you have cut away from me a long time ago.
Now I am not nearly as smart as Steve Jobs. I don’t know how my computer works, I don’t even know how my toaster works!
And the YouTube comments, Oh the world of snarky comments we’re living in. And perhaps that’s the most terrifying thing of all. And what we do now is permanent.
But I didn’t back out. I’m here speaking to you today. And I know I will be judged by all those who care to watch on YouTube and compared. But my lesson is this: I don’t give a shit.
OK. I am sorry.
Now listen up. You cannot let a fear of failure or a fear of comparison or a fear of judgement stop you from doing what’s going to make you great. You cannot succeed without this risk of failure. You cannot have a voice without the risk of criticism. And you cannot love without the risk of loss. You must go out and you must take these risks.
Everything I’m truly proud of in this life has been a terrifying prospect to me. From my first play, to hosting “Saturday Night Live,” to getting married, to being a father, to speaking to you today. None of it comes easy. And people will tell you to do what makes you happy, but a lot of this has been hard work. And I’m not always happy.
You cannot let a fear of failure or a fear of comparison or a fear of judgement stop you from doing what’s going to make you great. You cannot succeed without this risk of failure. You cannot have a voice without the risk of criticism. And you cannot love without the risk of loss. You must go out and you must take these risks.
And I don’t think you should do just what makes you happy. I think you should do what makes you great. Do what’s uncomfortable and scary and hard but pays off in the long run. Be willing to fail. Let yourself fail. Fail in the way and place where you would want to fail. Fail, pick yourself up and fail again. Because without this struggle, what is your success anyway?
Look, as best we know we have one life. In it, you have to trust your own voice, your own ideas, your honesty, your vulnerability and through this you will find your way. You do not have to be fearless; just don’t let fear stop you.
Live like this as best as you can and I guarantee you will look back on a life well lived.
You are capable of greatness in your profession and more importantly in your quality of self.
Stay hungry. Stay young at heart. Take those risks.
You are going to change the world around you in big ways and in small and I greatly look forward to being a part of the future that you will shape.
Congratulations graduates. And good luck.
Good people are found, not changed. They can change themselves, but you can’t change them
You can’t send a duck to eagle school is a metaphor for the truism: You can not give what you don’t have. A duck can try but it can never soar as high as the eagle. It is not in the DNA of the duck to soar that high, even if you send the duck to an eagle school. The same is true for humans, we all have limitless potential but until we nurture it, push our boundaries, leave our comfort zone(s), take risks continuously, and fail forward. We would continue to be ducks unless we unleash the eagle in us.
Just like dynamites, the power’s on the inside and nothing happens until the fuse gets detonated. The same goes for us all. We obey Newton’s first law of motion which states that a body at remains at rest or if in motion, remains in motion at a constant velocity unless acted upon by a net external force. Our human natural tendency is Homeostasis.
In Never Go Back, bestselling author Dr. Henry Cloud shares ten doorways to success. The 10 principles of never going back includes never:
1. Return to what hasn’t worked
2. Do anything that requires you to be someone else
3. Try to change another person
4. Believe that you can please everyone
5. Choose short-term comfort over long-term benefit
6. Trust someone or something flawless
7. Take your eyes off the big picture
8. Neglect to do due diligenc e
9. Fail to ask why you are where you are
10. Forget that your inner life produces your outer success
Theme – Never Go Back
There are certain awakenings that people have—in life and in business—that once they have them, they never go back to the old way of doing things. And when that happens, they are never the same. In short, they got it .
Once we intellectually understand what we should never do again, how do we actually change? It’s one thing to “understand”; it’s quite another to live out that understanding. Unfortunately, we humans often repeat the same mistakes over and over again.
When we go through certain doorways of understanding, we never go back to our old way of seeing things
