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Well thank you so much. Jerry - dear friend. Naropa University graduating class,
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relatives, friends, uh - I'm deeply moved and I'm profoundly grateful to be here. Uh
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- this is a wonderful moment in everyone's life and
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I'm going to take just a brief moment of - personal time to say its doubly wonderful
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for me because not only is my wife here but my
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son - and his wife and my two little grand daughters - ages 8 and 6. CLAPPING...are
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here and uh you guys know who I mean right? Ok good.
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And I just want to say a word about them because I have been thinking about them in the
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Naropa context. So - two years ago my wife and I were - in Golden and we were hiking
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in the foothills with - Nia then 6 years old and Kiara age 4 at the time. And Nia was -
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they both were hiking barefoot up these rocky trails and I finally asked Nia how can you
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do that - it just - it hurts me to just watch you - walk this terrain barefoot. And she
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very quickly and instinctively said well I'm a
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nature girl - nature loves me and I love nature except for the spiky parts! LAUGHING.
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At which point Kiara then 4 - wanted to say something about herself and she said and
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grandpa I'm a vegetarian except for bacon. LAUGHING.
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So my sense is that these two fit the Naropa vibe - would you agree?
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CLAPPING
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And I'm going - I have schedule visits with the admissions department for both of them
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right after - right after this uh - this ceremony.
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I'm honored to be here, but my true honor is that I get to share this important moment
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in the lives of the lass of 2015.
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A deep bow to all of you. And a deep bow also - to the friends and family and relatives
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and strangers and the staff and the faculty and administration of Naropa University who
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have helped you come to this day.
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Naropa is a very special place. I think some of you know - that the contemplative
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teaching and learning movement is now getting traction in higher education around the
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country. It's slow but its coming. Coming to an extent one could not have imagined 40
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years ago - when this university was founded. Let alone even 30 or 20 years ago. And
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Naropa has planted those seeds. Uh this is a greenery of something that is now growing.
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Our task is to let the world know where the greenery is uh so let's try to do that. Get
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- get the - CLAPPING - get the word out. I have
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tried to be your emissary - I want to do that on into the future because I think what happens
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here is a very important contribution not only to you as individuals but to higher education
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and to the world - at large.
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I have two modest graduation gifts for the class of 2015. I wish I had more to offer
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- but for now this.
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The first is 6 brief suggestions about the road ahead of you. And the second is a promise
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to stop talking in about 12 minutes so that you can get on that road. CHEERING
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Sooner rather than later.
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My first suggestion is simple - be reckless when it comes to affairs of the heart.
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All right. CHEERING
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Now since half of you misinterpreted that I'm - LAUGHING --
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It's true I was - I spent the 60s in Berkeley, but I am 76 now and uh - there may be snow
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on the roof but there is still a fire in the furnace. What I -- CHEERING!
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Anybody know CPR - I don't know. LAUGHING
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What I really mean parents and grandparents...
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Is be passionate. Fall madly in love with life. Be passionate about some part of the
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natural and or human worlds and take risks on its behalf no matter how vulnerable they
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make you. No one ever died saying I'm sure glad for the self centered, self serving and
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self protective life I lived. LAUGHING
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Offer yourself to the world. Your energies, your gifts, your vision, your heart with open
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hearted generosity, but understand that when you live that way you will soon learn how
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little you know and how easy it is to fail - to grow and love in service you, I, all
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of us must value ignorance as much as knowledge
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and failure as much as success.
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I know this is ironic advice on graduation day.
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But clinging to what you already know and do well - is the path to an unlived life.
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So cultivate beginners mind. Walk straight into
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your not knowing and take the risk of failing and falling again and again then getting up
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again and again to learn.
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That's the path to a life lived large in service of love, truth and justice.
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Second, as you integrate ignorance and failure into your knowledge and success. Do the
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same with all the alien parts of yourself. Take everything that's bright and beautiful
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in you and introduce it to the shadow side of
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yourself.
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Let your altruism meet your egotism.
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Let your generosity meet your greed.
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Let your joy meet your grief. Everyone has a shadow even Buddhists, even Quakers -
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even high-minded people like us. Especially high-minded people like us. CLAPPING
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But when you are able to say I am all of the above - my shadow as well as my light - the
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shadow's power is put in service of the good.
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Wholeness is the goal that wholeness does not mean perfection. It means embracing
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brokenness as an integral part of your life.
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As a person who as Jerry said - has made three deep dives - into depression a long the
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way. I do not speak lightly of this.
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I simply know that it is true.
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As you acknowledge and embrace all that you are - you give yourself a gift that will
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benefit the rest of us as well.
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Our world is in desperate need of leaders who live what Socrates called an examined
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life.
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In critical areas like politics, religion, business and the mass media - too many leaders
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refuse to name and claim their shadows because they don't want to look weak.
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CLAPPING
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With shadows that go unexamined and unchecked - they use power heedlessly in ways
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that harm countless people and undermine public trust in our major institutions. If you
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value self-knowledge - you will become the leaders we need to help renew the society.
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But if for some reason and I doubt that there is anyone like this here - if for some reason
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you chose to live an unexamined life after you leave this place - I beg of you - do not
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take a job that involves other people. LAUGHING
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CLAPPING
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Third, and critically important - as you welcome whatever you find alien within yourself
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- extend that same welcome to whatever you find alien in the outer world. I don't know
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any virtue more important these days than hospitality to the stranger. To those we
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perceive as other than us.
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The old majority in this society - people who look like me is on its way out. By 20
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- yes...
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By 2045 - the majority of Americans will be people of color.
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CHEERING
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The sad fact is that many in the old majority fear that fact and their fear - their fear
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shamelessly manipulated by too many politicians is bringing us down.
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CLAPPING
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The renewal this nation needs will not come from people who are afraid of otherness and
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race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation. CLAPPING
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Its because of that fear that our once vital society is grid locked and stagnant and our
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main hope for renewal is diversity welcomed and embraced. I recently met a professor on
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a visit to Southern California who had left a prestigious institution predominantly white
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to teach undocumented youth in Southern California. I asked him how it was going and
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he said best move I ever made - my previous students felt entitled and demanded to be
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entertained.
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My undocumented students are hungry to learn, hardworking and courageous enough to
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keep moving out of their comfort zones.
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America will be renewed by people with these qualities.
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CLAPPING
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And if we - if we - who have privilege and power will welcome them, collaborate with
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them and help remove the obstacles in their way - 2045 will be a year of great promise
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for all of us.
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Fourth, take on big jobs worth doing. Jobs like the spread of love, peace and justice.
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That means refusing to be seduced by our cultural obsession with being effective as
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measured by short term results.
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We all want our work to make a difference, but if we take on the big jobs - and our only
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measure of success is next quarter's bottom line - we will end up disappointed, dropping
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out and in disappear.
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Think of someone you respect because he or she lived a life devoted to high values. Or
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Rosa Parks or Nelson Mandela or someone known only to a few.
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At the end of the road was that person able to say I am sure glad I devoted my life to
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that job - because now everyone in the world can
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check it off their to do lists forever and ever.
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No, our heroes take on impossible jobs and stay with them for the long haul because they
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live by a standard that trumps effectiveness. The name of that standard I think is
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faithfulness. Faithfulness to your gifts, faithfulness to your perception of the needs
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of the world and faithfulness to offering your gifts
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to whatever needs are within your reach.
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The tighter we cling to the norm of the effectiveness, the smaller the tasks we'll take on
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because they are the only ones that get short-term results. Public education is a tragic
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example.
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We in this country no longer care about educating children. A big job that's never done.
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We care only about getting kids to pass tests with measurable results.
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CLAPPING
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And we care about that - whether or not or without even considering whether they
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measure anything that matters. In the process we are crushing the spirits of a lot of good
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teachers and vulnerable kids. Care about being effective of course. But care even more
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about being faithful as countless teachers do. Faithful to your calling. And to the true
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needs of those entrusted to your care.
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You won't get the big jobs done in your lifetime, but if at the end of the day you can say -
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I was faithful - I think you will be ok. CLAPPING
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Fifth, since suffering I don't need to tell this to Buddhists - I just didn't know you
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could have so much fun. That's all I didn't know.
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Since suffering as well as joy comes with being human I urge you to remember this -- violence
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is what happens when we don't know what else to do with our suffering. Violence
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is what happens when we don't know what else to do with our suffering.
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Sometimes we aim that violence at ourselves as in overwork that leads to burn our or
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worse. Or in the many forms of substance abuse. Sometimes we aim that violence at
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other people. Racism, sexism and homophobia often come from people trying to relieve
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their suffering by claiming superiority over others.
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The good news is that suffering can be transformed into something that brings life not
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death. It happens every day.
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I am 76 years old. I now know many people who have suffered the loss of the dearest
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person in their lives.
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At first they go into deep grief certain that their lives will never again be worth living.
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But then they slowly awaken to the fact that not in spite of their loss but because of
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it. They've become bigger, more compassionate
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people with more capacity of heart to take in other people's sorrows and joys.
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These are broken hearted people, but their hearts have been broken open rather than
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broken apart.
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So every day exercise your heart by taking in life's little pains and joys. That kind
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of exercise will make your heart supple the way
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a runner makes a muscle supple. So that when it breaks and it surely will - it will
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break not into a fragment grenade, but into a
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greater capacity for love.
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Sixth, and finally I quote St. Benedict - not a Buddhist but still worth quoting. Who said
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daily keep your death before your eyes.
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That may sound like a morbid practice but as I think you know it isn't - if you hold
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a healthy awareness of your own mortality - your
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eyes will be opened to the grandeur and glory of life.
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And that will evoke all of the virtues I have named as well as those I haven't.
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Such as hope, generosity and gratitude.
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If the unexamined life is not worth living - its equally true that the unlived life is
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not worth examining.
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So I'll close - with this brief quote from a great writer - Diane Ackerman - who reminds
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us to live - truly live our lives.
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And I quote:
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"The great affair - the love affair with life is to live as variously as possible. To groom
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one's curiosity like a high-spirited thoroughbred - climb aboard and gallop over the thick
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sun struck hills everyday.
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Where there is no risk - the emotional terrain is flat and unyielding and despite all its
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dimensions, valleys, pinnacles and detours - life will seem to have none of its magnificent
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geography - only a lynx. It began in mystery and it will end in mystery - but what a
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savage and beautiful country lies between.
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Once again, a deep bow to the class of 2015 to each and every one of you - traveling
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mercies and blessings - as you make the journey from one mystery to the next and the
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next and the next.
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CLAPPING