If You Want Your Garden to Flourish, Don't Reserve a Plot for Weeds

For more notes and context, please visit my post here on Medium. This is a leaned-down take for LinkedIn.

The 106th Commencement Address
at Junction City High School
Delivered by Class of 2000
Alumna Leslie Bradshaw

If you take nothing else away from what I am about to share, let it be this: to be successful, you need to…

• Master teamwork;
• Persevere; and
• Maintain a positive, gracious attitude.

The rest of what I am about to say are just the details. So if you want, go ahead and feel free to go back to Snapchatting, Instagramming, and surfing Reddit. As for those of you interested in the details, here they are…

Teamwork

There is nothing great that you will accomplish in life—be it college, at your job, with your family—that won’t happen without teamwork. Working on pep rallies, the yearbook, AP projects, and playing three sports in this community taught me that Together Everyone Achieves More. TEAM.

You know what I am talking about. Daily doubles. The Pub room. Away games. Take this with you, always.

Radically collaborate with your coworkers, fellow soldiers, college classmates, life partner, and family members. It will be more fun and you will get more done. Just like you did over the past four years here at JCHS.

Perseverance

Think of your life like a farmer, with the ebb and flow of seasons representing the stages and phases of your life. 

Harvest

Right at this moment, you are in a season of harvest. Rejoice. You’ve worked hard for four years: tending to the field that was your high school career; watering the plants that were your assignments and tests; and reaping the harvest of your diploma, of knowledge, and of lifelong friendships.

Planting

Tomorrow, you are back to having a barren field. Freshly tilled from the celebrations of today and tonight, laying fallow awaiting the seeds you choose to cultivate. So what will you plant? Is it time to enroll in college or vocational school? Is it time to enlist and serve your country? Or perhaps start a family? Along the way, make sure planting the seeds of savings and investment are a part of your strategy. Start now, even if it’s just a few dollars a week. Apps like Digit (savings) and Robin Hood (stock trading) can help you start and establish habits, then eventually graduate to having your own money manager. Whatever goal you have for this next stage of your life, set it, commit to it, and work towards it. Every. Single. Day.

Persevere as you consider what to study and where to work. At the same time, pick things that excite and engage you.

Firstly because it will ensure you show up to class and learn essential, foundational skills like managing your time, reading critically, persuading effectively, writing well, and working on a team.

And secondly, because you only get one shot at life and it’s important that you maximize joy.

Weeding

It will also take being vigilant about the health of your crop. Related… one thing I learned the hard way is:

“If you want a flourishing garden, you cannot reserve a plot for weeds.”
—Dag Hammarskj?ld,
UN Secretary General 1953–1961

There are undoubtedly people, habits, and negative thoughts that are weeds in your life right now. They are stripping your soil of vital nutrients. They are blocking your leaves from the sunlight they need to perform photosynthesis. Get rid of them. Cut them out at the roots. Spray for them so you eradicate them for generations to come.

No great farmer says:

“Oh yeah, I have this sectioned off for my weeds. I like to grow patches of blackberries, scotch-broom, poison oak, and dandelions.” —said no great farmer, ever

Weeds spread! They inhibit, constrict, and limit life. They will keep you from becoming the wonderful, brilliant, happy, and successful person you are destined to become. So be vigilant. And be patient—for you cannot always be in a season of harvest. And persevere, so that you can in fact find yourself in a position to harvest something wonderful like this moment again soon.

Attitude

Third and finally…

“Your attitude will ultimately determine
your altitude.”?—?Zig Ziglar

The softball team that Mrs. Henderson played on with me had a motto: PMA (“Positive Mental Attitude”) all the way! No matter how many times we got rained on (or out) or how much it hurt when we got hit by a ball… gotta stay positive. And in the words of Beyoncé…

“Always stay gracious, the best revenge is your paper.” —Beyoncé, Formation

While you stay gracious, look for ways to meaningfully help others. If you can help two people in a deep, material way every year for the next forty years… and they each do the same… together, you can all impact 850,000 people in just four decades.

In the class of 2016, I am proud to have deeply impacted the lives of Evelyn Tedrick and Kelsey McFadden as their mentor. And I know it will reverberate for many years to come.

In short: take pride in reaching back to help. It’s our responsibility, for:

“To whom much was given,
of him much will be required.”
—Luke 12:48

I am so excited for each and every one of you. I’ve lived all over and I can honestly say that fancy city folk who have gone to private schools have nothing on this town. I wouldn’t trade growing up here for anything. This community cares about and supports its own.

“This is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don’t be afraid.”
—Frederick Buechner,
writer and theologian