Life, Interrupted

Remarks to the Berry College Class of 2020

President Briggs, thank you for that incredibly kind introduction. And to the assembled faculty, staff, parents, friends, and graduates both here and at home—thank you for the honor and privilege of speaking with you today. Looking out over this sea of perfectly spaced masks, I can’t help but feel I’m addressing a well-ordered anesthesiologists convention. But such are the times in which we live. 

It’s an odd thing speaking to the May 2020 graduating class just before Christmas. It must be odd for you, too. In March you were finally relaxing into senior year booking hotels for commencement. Then we were all sent home for a few weeks, then a few months, then the better part of a year. But we’re finally here to celebrate you. And if there’s one thing I don’t have to tell you it’s this: Waiting is hard. 

2020 has been a constant reminder of that, right? Plans delayed. Life interrupted. I thought my greatest anticipation this year would be awaiting the birth of our fourth child in October not the precarious fulfillment of our first successful toilet paper purchase in April. Mike Tyson once famously quipped that “everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth” and 2020 has speed bagged everyone in a way that might put even Iron Mike on the ropes.

A once in a century pandemic. Widespread unemployment. Rampaging political divisions. Failing trust in institutions. And worldwide social unrest highlighting legacies of racism and sexism. These crises have divided our nation, this campus, and even our families and friends. We could spend hours discussing them, and it’s critical that we do.  

But today, I want to take the next few minutes to talk to you about something more personal. Most of your lives have been dramatically disrupted by this crisis. The home stretch of your senior year completed unceremoniously at home. Jobs scarce. Plans cancelled or delayed. So, I want to offer a few thoughts on managing life’s interruptions.

My first real experience with such interruptions was my graduation year. Up to that point, I’d always been pretty successful—a good GPA and a few awards and the feeling that personally and professionally, I was on a straight upward path. I took a summer job at a non-profit in DC, with vague notions of being a journalist or academic. But nothing quite came together, and I ended up searching wildly for any job I could find. The day I lost my apartment, I accepted an analyst position with a trading firm and couch-surfed with friends for two weeks until I found a place to live on Craigslist. I ended up occupying the basement of a 40-year-old clarinet player’s townhouse in the exurbs of Washington. I was really living the dream! My girlfriend and I broke up. I ended up struggling at my new job so much that I had to resign only a few months in; and I found myself—less than a year removed from graduation—wondering what in the world I would do with my life. That unbroken upward path I imagined wasn’t so unbroken.

It wasn’t the last time my carefully laid plans came crashing down. In the intervening years, I’ve faced graduate school rejections, delays in employment, tumultuous relationships, and lost loved ones. While none of these prior experiences rose to the level of global pandemic, they have taught me a few things about living through and learning from life’s interruptions. 

First, these experiences have taught me to hold things loosely—to bend, not break. Earlier this year, my wife and I had a tree removed from our yard. It was a beautiful old oak, but it was dying. And our first sign of danger was that when the trees around it would sway in the wind, this oak would stand rigid and inflexible—a clear indication it was brittle and might fall. It reminded me of an old Ani DiFranco lyric I love:

Buildings and bridges

Are made to bend in the wind

To withstand the world

That's what it takes

All that steel and stone

Are no match for the air, my friend

What doesn't bend breaks

There’s a temptation in this world to become rigid like that dying oak—too wed to our identities and our plans. We tie our happiness to job titles, or physical attractiveness, professional success, or athletic prowess. We plot our futures carefully. But the dirty little secret of life is that at some point each of those plans and identities will fail. We’ll lose a job. A loved one will leave us. Our beauty will fade. Learning to adapt to that, to master what Buddhists often refer to as “enjoyment without attachment” allows us to sway with the winds of life rather than toppling down. Is there something you’re holding a bit too tightly today? Has something this year shaken your carefully laid plans or your sense of self-worth? I’d venture that it has. And if it hasn’t yet, sometime soon it will. When it does, learn to adapt not collapse. You contain multitudes, graduates. The failure of one thing isn’t a failure of everything. Learn to bend, but not break. 

Second, when life is at its most difficult, I’ve learned to lean on others. The hardest thing in the world is to weather life’s interruptions alone. And the best thing you can do in dark moments is to love one another. I was reminded of this very recently. Six weeks ago, my wife and I welcomed our fourth child into the world. Two weeks later, he developed colic and we began to notice strange movements in his eyes. On Friday night November 20th, we were planning a movie night at home. But a neurologist saw videos of our son’s symptoms and rushed us to the emergency room, afraid he was having seizures. A normal weekend turned into a nightmare, as worried doctors floated terms no parent wants to hear and proceeded to subject our 25-day-old baby to a battery of blood draws, CT Scans, MRIs, IVs, and tests. Over the five days we were in the hospital, his mom and I were broken…sleep deprived, stressed, and scared for a child who couldn’t possibly deserve what he was experiencing. But in our darkest moments we also encountered incredible love. Family stepping in to help. Friends calling and texting, ordering meals and offering support. Doctors and nurses treating us with kindness. Some of these people barely knew us, but they exemplified the best of Martha Berry’s motto, “Not to be ministered unto but to minister.” And without any other options, we relied on them. We were eventually released from the hospital just before Thanksgiving, the worst of the options ruled out, but reminded how little control we have and how much we need each other. I don’t know your story, but I bet some of you or your friends and family have struggled this year—with loneliness, failing health, substance abuse, financial insecurity, or stress. In those times, row together. Lean on each other. Love one another. 

Third, even in difficult or uncertain times, I’ve learned to search diligently for joy and gratitude. Like many of you, I’d consider this one of the most difficult years of my life. An extreme extrovert, I’ve been secluded stir crazy in my home office—the equivalent of sending an introvert to Disney World every day for the last seven months. Work has been tumultuous and uncertain. Relationships have been difficult to maintain. And the health and education of our growing family has been a constant concern. And yet, sometime in late March as the stress was building, I began to experience new moments of joy. The flowers blossomed. I started to take calls outside, getting more sunshine and fresh air than I had in years. And my kids, who were used to me traveling 3-4 days a week, began to run into my office unannounced in the middle of the day laughing and offering hugs. Life was still hard, but as I looked closely it was also full of new and unexpected grace. It would be Pollyannish to simply instruct you to look on the bright side. Hard times are still hard times. And finding joy in life’s bleakest moments can require a conscious effort. But joy is always there if we strain to see it. A few years ago, in another dark, interrupted moment, I started keeping a gratitude journal daily—not because I had so much to be grateful for, but because I was struggling to be grateful at all. Each day, I’d sit quietly for a few minutes and try to think of one good thing. And gradually, after a few days, the little joys and pleasures were easier to see. Gratitude is hardest when life is hardest, graduates. Joy is often toughest to see when life is interrupted. But it’s in precisely those times that joy is so important to seek.

Finally, when life’s interruptions knock us down, I’ve learned we must get off the mat fight back to our feet. One of my favorite articles at the beginning of this pandemic was penned by Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters. Lamenting the necessary cancellation of rock concerts around the world, Grohl wrote:

I don’t know when it will be safe to return to singing arm in arm at the top of our lungs, hearts racing, bodies moving, souls bursting with life. But I do know that we will do it again, because we have to. It’s not a choice. We’re human. We need moments that reassure us that we are not alone. That we are understood. That we are imperfect. And, most important, that we need each other. 

This crisis won’t last forever. Countries will reopen their borders. Businesses will return to work. The jobs will come back. We’ll be able to congregate together and sing together and laugh together again. And when that time comes, don’t let yourself be hampered by the hangover of this year. Throw yourself back into the world with a recklessness that will truly signal an end to this pandemic. I love that while I’m no Dave Grohl and this isn’t exactly a rock concert, even this little gathering is a hopeful act. Our goal should be to live fully as a people bent but unbroken by a time that sought to assault our spirits but couldn’t permanently dampen the essential enthusiasm we have for this world. Life gets interrupted. Our plans get punched in the mouth. But we will get off the mat and fight back because we have to. Keep your confidence. Book a trip somewhere next summer and explore this wild planet we call home. Keep dreaming and keep planning—undeterred by the setbacks. The interruptions will happen again and again, graduates. That’s life. But you’ll recover from each one. 

Congratulations, Class of 2020. I’m so grateful and so humbled to be here with you today. This celebration is delayed but undiminished. The interruption was not the end. And your futures—all of our futures—are bright. Thank you. 

View the full ceremony here (remarks just after 39:00): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i15USgRFkSI

A shorter clip of just my remarks here: https://youtu.be/ARPX1z14K-o