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Helping San Diego, California and beyond since 1997.
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Vonnegut Speech
What follows is the Commencement address that Kurt Vonnegut recently gave at MIT. It is very
insightful!
Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Oh, never mind. You will not understand the power
and beauty of your youth until they've faded. But trust me, in 20 years, you'll look back at photos
of yourself and recall in a way, you can't grasp now, how much possibility lay before you and how
fabulous you really looked. You are not as fat as you imagine.
Keep your old love letters. Throw away your old bank statements.
Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your living room.
Read the directions, even if you don't follow them.
Get to know your parents. You never know when they'll be gone for good.
Understand that friends come and go, but with a precious few you should
hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, because
the older you get, the more you need the people who knew you when you were
young.
Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in
Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft.
Travel.
Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will
philander. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you'll fantasize
that when
you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were
noble, and children respected their elders.
Respect your elders.
Don't expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund.
Maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse. But you never know when either one might
run out.
Don't mess too much with your hair or by the time you're 40 it will
look 85.
Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply
it.
Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the
past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and
recycling it
for more than it's worth.
But trust me on the sun screen.
Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '98:
Wear sun screen.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sun screen would be it. The long-term benefits of
sun screen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more
reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now.
Don't worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve
an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that
never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blind-side you at 4 pm on some idle Tuesday.
Do one thing every day that scares you.
Sing.
Don't be reckless with other people's hearts. Don't put up with people who are reckless with
yours.
Floss.
Don't waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind. The race is
long and, in the end, it's only with yourself.
Remember compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.
Stretch.
Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting
people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives. Some of the most
interesting 40-year-old's I know still don't.
Get plenty of calcium. Be kind to your knees. You'll miss them when they're gone.
Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll have children, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll
divorce at 40, maybe you'll dance the funky chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary. Whatever
you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. Your choices are half
chance. So are everybody else's.
Enjoy your body. Use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of it or of what other people think of
it. It's the greatest instrument you'll ever own.
Do not read beauty magazines. They will only make you feel ugly.
Be nice to your siblings. They're your best link to your past and the people
most likely to stick with you in the future.
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