Teacher tells graduates: “You are not special.”

McCullough tells students: "You are not special."

There are some messages that need to be said, and some that people don’t want to hear. Often, a single message is both. When Wellesley High School English teacher David McCullough stepped up to the mic to deliver the commencement address to the Class of 2012, he delivered one of those messages. He told them:

“You are not special. You are not exceptional.”

With his reading glasses and his slightly unkempt hair, he looked every bit the part of English teacher and strikingly resonated the message he was about to deliver. He told the students, “…your ceremonial costume… shapeless, uniform, one-size-fits-all. Whether male or female, tall or short, scholar or slacker, spray-tanned prom queen or intergalactic X-Box assassin, each of you is dressed, you’ll notice, exactly the same. And your diploma… but for your name, exactly the same.

All of this is as it should be, because none of you is special.”

Now, before you begin leaping to conclusions and shouting things like “how dare he tell my little pumpkin that she is anything less than amazing!” allow me to add some additional context. McCullough continued:

“The empirical evidence is everywhere, numbers even an English teacher can’t ignore. Newton, Natick, Needham, that has to be two thousand high school graduates right there, give or take, and that’s just the neighborhood numbers. Across the country no fewer than 3.2 million seniors are graduating about now from more than 37,000 high schools. That’s 37,000 valedictorians… 37,000 class presidents… 92,000 harmonizing altos… 340,000 swaggering jocks… 2,185,967 pairs of Uggs. But why limit ourselves to high school? After all, you’re leaving it. So think about this: even if you’re one in a million, on a planet of 6.8 billion that means there are nearly 7,000 people just like you.”

He wasn’t beating them up to be mean or belittling. The truth is he was a teacher, through and through and to the end. Though they sat before him at commencement, the end of one era and the beginning of the next, he was taking one final moment to teach:

“As you commence, then, and before you scatter to the winds, I urge you to do whatever you do for no reason other than you love it and believe in its importance.”

“Resist the easy comforts of complacency, the specious glitter of materialism, the narcotic paralysis of self-satisfaction. Be worthy of your advantages. Read as a nourishing staple of life. Develop and protect a moral sensibility and demonstrate the character to apply it. Dream big. Work hard. Think for yourself. Love everything you love, everyone you love, with all your might.”

“The fulfilling life, the distinctive life, the relevant life, is an achievement, not something that will fall into your lap because you’re a nice person or mommy ordered it from the caterer. You’ll note the founding fathers took pains to secure your inalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness–quite an active verb, “pursuit”–which leaves, I should think, little time for lying around watching parrots rollerskate on Youtube. The first President Roosevelt, the old rough rider, advocated the strenuous life. Mr. Thoreau wanted to drive life into a corner, to live deep and suck out all the marrow. The poet Mary Oliver tells us to row, row into the swirl and roil. Don’t wait for inspiration or passion to find you. Get up, get out, explore, find it yourself, and grab hold with both hands.”

Like accolades ought to be, the fulfilled life is a consequence, a gratifying byproduct. It’s what happens when you’re thinking about more important things. Climb the mountain not to plant your flag, but to embrace the challenge, enjoy the air and behold the view. Climb it so you can see the world, not so the world can see you. Go to Paris to be in Paris, not to cross it off your list and congratulate yourself for being worldly. Exercise free will and creative, independent thought not for the satisfactions they will bring you, but for the good they will do others, the rest of the 6.8 billion–and those who will follow them. And then you too will discover the great and curious truth of the human experience is that selflessness is the best thing you can do for yourself. The sweetest joys of life, then, come only with the recognition that you’re not special.

Because everyone is.

Congratulations. Good luck. Make for yourselves, please, for your sake and for ours, extraordinary lives.

Personally, I can think of no better message to deliver to our kids, at commencement and minute-by-minute as they work through school to reach that milestone. You see, part of the problem– maybe the biggest part– is us. Parents of our generation are creating such coddling environments that our kids have very little self-sufficiency. McCullough says that, “we Americans, to our detriment, come to love accolades more than genuine achievement. We have come to see them as the point — and we’re happy to compromise standards, or ignore reality, if we suspect that’s the quickest way, or only way, to have something to put on the mantelpiece, something to pose with, crow about, something with which to leverage ourselves into a better spot on the social totem pole.” He’s right. And when he points this out to the graduating class he places the blame exactly where it belongs: with us.

“You’ve been pampered, cosseted, doted upon, helmeted, bubble-wrapped. Yes, capable adults with other things to do have held you, kissed you, fed you, wiped your mouth, wiped your bottom, trained you, taught you, tutored you, coached you, listened to you, counseled you, encouraged you, consoled you and encouraged you again. You’ve been nudged, cajoled, wheedled and implored. You’ve been feted and fawned over and called sweetie pie. Yes, you have. And, certainly, we’ve been to your games, your plays, your recitals, your science fairs. Absolutely, smiles ignite when you walk into a room, and hundreds gasp with delight at your every tweet. Why, maybe you’ve even had your picture in the Townsman! And now you’ve conquered high school… and, indisputably, here we all have gathered for you, the pride and joy of this fine community, the first to emerge from that magnificent new building…

But do not get the idea you’re anything special. Because you’re not.”

I admire him for his insight. I applaud him for his courage. I will honor him by doing all I can to remember these words with each interaction with kids, both mine and others, to encourage them to live their lives not to garnish the accolades, but the for sake of actually living their lives. I will encourage them, at all times, to “climb the mountain not to plant your flag, but to embrace the challenge, enjoy the air and behold the view. Climb it so you can see the world, not so the world can see you.”

I’ve presented you with the Cliff Notes version. For the full effect, watch David McCullough deliver the address himself:

Steve Jobs tells “how to live before you die”

In June 2005, Steve Jobs delivered the commencement address at Stanford. It was a talk where he promised to tell “only three stories about my life. No big deal. Just three stories…” In these three stories, he encompasses formative moments that helped make him what he is and he outlines several notions these recent graduates would do well to remember. They include:

Find what you love.

“You’ve got to find what you love. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.”

Live each day as if it were your last.

“When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: ‘If you live each day as if it was you’re last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.’ It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I’ve looked in the mirror every day and asked myself, “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer is “no” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something. Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything, all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure, these things all fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

Stay hungry. Stay foolish.

“No one wants to die. And yet, death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It’s Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.”

“Right now, the new is you. But someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it’s quite true. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And, most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become.”

It’s a very good speech, and I recommend you watch it:

    Marketers Note: Longer is Better

    Seth Godin makes an interesting point in this post about longer video being better than shorter commercial spots. His point, in a nutshell, is that airtime (provided by the ‘Net) is cheap (or free), so why not use it and the longer format to make your point?

    Not a bad thought. It reminds me of many conversations I’ve had recently where I’ve been essentially arguing on behalf of longer copy in a whole variety of situations: direct mail, email, online, etc.

    “Nobody reads!” you shout. “Hogwash,” I reply. People read all the time. The key is to write something worth reading (which, in reality, is also the tough part.) Tough, but not impossible. Here are a couple of things to remember:

    First, write directly to the reader. I could write all day about “we” and “all of our customers”, but I really want to talk to you; about you. I’m reminded of a story about young copywriter who was trying to get hired by Maxwell Sackheim. Sackheim wasn’t all that impressed with the man until the writer bet him $10 he could write a full-page newspaper ad, solid type, that would be compelling enough to get him to read every word. To convince him, he showed him the headline:

    This Page Is All About Maxwell Sackheim

    He won the bet and the job.

    Next, use enough space to tell the story and fully explain your product, service, concept. Don’t be held to someone else’s idea about what is long or short enough. Use the space necessary, but edit relentlessly.

    Finally, lest you think it’s not important, Marketing Sherpa regularly reports that the single most effective way to raise response and conversion is not with graphics or frequency or a better offer. It’s by writing better copy.

    You Can Fool Some of the People…

    We’re doing some work for a new client and, as we sometimes do, we were perusing the web site of their previous vendor. Within their marketing copy on the site, the previous vendor touts the ease of which updates can be made using their software. They also mentioned, in the case study regarding this particular client, how great the site navigation is and that the site allows the visitor to easily see all the iterations of the product line.

    Now, I’ve been known to be a little cynical, but I’ve also been known to be a big fan of writing good, compelling copy. The problem in this case, is that the previous vendor has either:

    1. made all of this stuff up,
    2. not really asked the client what they thought, or
    3. really believes their own marketing copy.

    Regardless of the reason, it’s a telling lesson: We’re actually doing this work because the previous software was impossible to use, the site navigation was horrid, and the client was frustrated to the point of seeking a new solution.

    Folks, talk to your customers. Often. Be inquisitive. Ask them if they’re happy and, if not, find out why and what you can do to fix it.

    Unless, of course, you’re a direct competitor to all of us at Rare Bird. In that case, keep up the good work.

    I have another story about how this relates to e-commerce. More on that later.