Our 2020 grads enter a changed world, and so do we, as we
struggle to reopen businesses and revive the economy. Most of us left high school
and entered a landscape we recognized. Today we all face a changed world and
adapting to that change lies incumbent upon all of us. What are the lessons we
hope our grads are embedding through this upheaval of change?
Life is a series of adaptations. Our economy was
brought to its knees by an invisible virus, and it still lurks unseen in every interaction.
Adapting to that risk means evaluating vulnerabilities, taking precautions and
living responsibly. Sometimes it means donning masks. Sometimes it means
sanitizing surfaces we never worried about before. We stand on principles, but
we adapt to inconvenience. Social adaptation in psychology
means employing the broadest measures for the welfare of all. Success rests on
accepting this basic premise and embracing life nonetheless.
Measures of success are variable. Those who measured
success by title or bank account learned that success is less about achievement
and more about being. Being alive is good. Being true to one’s own conscience
is good. Being a person who respects and protects life is good. Mike Fishbein is
an excellent resource on this topic. We have learned that things are less important
than people. Broadly stated, we hope all who have breathed the virus-laden air
of 2020 and will hopefully remember: Success is less about things and more
about life.
Courage is living. The greatest generation, who
fought through a world war on multiple fronts and preserved our freedom, left
us a blueprint for facing COVID-19. It’s a simple blueprint. Uncertain life
fell upon our landscape as families waited for word their loved ones lived. On
the front lines, soldiers sacrificed and died for their loved ones and
comrades. And in the face of all that impending loss, they lived. They planted
victory gardens. They played baseball between maneuvers. They served at the Red
Cross. They saved a nation. We, too, must live in the face of an unseen enemy
while protecting both ourselves and our most vulnerable. But we must go on
living.
Division is deadly. Never in our lifetime has
partisan politics been more divisive than it is now. A hundred thousand armchair
virologists have tweeted and messaged their own opinions of a very complicated
and ever-changing viral attack on humanity. No one knew the best way to handle
the pandemic. Some measures were productive, some less so. Understanding brought
changing guidelines, changing opinions. Anxiety brought out the worst in
everyone. Did you see Remember the Titans? In one scene they ran through
forests and bogs to the site of the historic battle of Gettysburg. In their divisions
they were reliving and still fighting the battle of yesteryear, and they had to
put that old war aside to succeed. We, too, must put aside opinion and division,
must unite to save our nation. Our enemy isn’t our neighbor, it’s the unseen.
We can destroy one another or destroy a virus, but perhaps not both. What does
the Qatar-owned Aljazeerah network say about this? In The
Disunified States our partisanship spells “disaster.”
We’ve learned that hard times define us as a nation. Our
American spirit does not, nor did it ever lie in events or outcomes. It has
always resided in the spirit of its people. Our graduates deserve a huge
measure of credit for accepting personal losses gracefully, for their
willingness to adapt to this changed world bravely, and for their optimism in
going forward. Well done, 2020 grads, and also…well done to all
of you as you pick up your work and move forward. Well done.
