Translator: Denise RQ Reviewer: Robert Deliman
I haven't been here as long as Professor Vice,
but one of my earliest memories
is framed by howling wind whipping at my hair and jacket
as I streak down that Keddie Mountain,
skis spread-wide, with a smile that is somehow wider.
I knew no boundaries, I needed no hand to hold,
I was going fast, I was having fun,
and I couldn't care less about what would happen next.
Yes, it's cute little me up there.
As a native of Southern California, I don't typically ski often.
In fact I think I've only been five times in my life.
And so my most recent foray down the slope was an entirely different experience.
That Keddie Mountain seemed infinitely higher,
its curves and contours far more treacherous
than anything I had ever seen before.
It's this duality, this dichotomy even,
between child and adult, between the tabula rasa and experience
that leads me to believe that we are all born fearless.
And in our own right, we are all born heroes.
We can do anything, say anything, be anyone.
We can soar weightless and accomplish all that we dream.
We are all born heroes.
But as many of us have found,
this stage in our lives doesn't last long
for experience carves out our personalities,
makes us who we are today, makes us human.
Our upbringing and our environments
make us future lawyers, leaders, doctors, teachers, artists, advocates,
but with these wonderful experiences comes fear, phobias, and trauma
some of which can be literally crippling.
In the media, in TV, advertisements, and the Internet, and books, and plays,
we are constantly told that to be perfect, to be happy, to be successful,
we must be fearless.
We are told what we can and cannot fear based on constructed notions of gender,
based on economic status, based on race, based on age.
We are shown these images of the fearless men and women
displayed across our billboards, saving the world in our movies,
smiting down their enemies in our TV shows,
and we are also shown these images of the cowards, of the antagonists,
all together looking weak, pitiful, and lost.
From military advertisements
to memorial pieces for 9/11 first responders,
we are told that having courage is having a lack of fear,
but when sniper fire rains down from the sky,
and the very building around you begins to crumble,
it's the presence of that heart-stopping, breath taking fear
that makes the feat of continuing onwards that much more meaningful.
Many of us as students here face several different fears
than our professors, than our teachers, and than our mentors
in that we don't necessarily know
what life path and life structure works best for us.
And unfortunately, there exists a good amount of societal pressure
to be fearless and to go full steam ahead after graduation.
And while we all harbor these very diverse interests,
we are taught to approach life after college in much the same way.
The very fact that we are all sitting in this room here
suggests that in the words of author Jared Diamond,
we perceive higher education to be a ticket to a job,
and that job to be a ticket to success.
We are told to aim for that economically advantageous job,
told to find it right away,
and then we are told to work and work and work,
and eventually, according to the college, the media in greater American society,
we will find success.
But who are these institutions
to dictate personal happiness, to dictate success?
If we are all so fantastically different, so incredibly diverse,
then how can so few life structures work for so many of us?
When I personally encounter stress in my day-to-day life,
I tend to zone out and focus on logic puzzles like a Rubik's cube.
I have a set memorized formula, but if you notice behind me,
there's the term freeform spatial logic.
And this is there because despite this overall memorized set structure,
there exist points where one must adapt to the current situation
and apply their own logic.
This is only one formula of many,
and this formula contains several combinations
to achieve the ultimate success,
but with a single Rubik's cube,
there exist 43 quintillion different combinations.
In the United States,
there are approximately 300 - give or take - million individuals;
these people with their own interests, ideas, values,
yet, the media propagates very few ideal life structures
if one wants to achieve success.
So let's think about.
This there exists
43 quintillion different combinations for a single piece of plastic,
yet, for 300 million individuals, if one wants to achieve success,
there are only two to three tops routes that one can take.
And I ask: how is the so? And how can we think about breaking out?
What we can do is harness our fears;
fear of drowning, fear of life, fear of death, fear of spiders,
fear of complex social interactions.
Fear, above all else, has the power to make us feel so strongly so often,
to challenge us in some of the most significant ways.
Our society operates under this assumption that fear is burdensome and harmful,
that if we want to reach for greater success and our potential,
then we need to push aside our fears.
But this always have to be so.
Now, a quick disclaimer before I continue any further:
despite my rather prestigious credentials
as a student and an optimist,
I'm not a psychology student
or a student of the natural sciences in the slightest,
but I have come to realize that fear of the unknown is formidable,
that uncertainty over one's future is powerful,
that indecision itself can be a path to success.
If one knows where to look;
but unfortunately,
our society is not hardwired to utilize fear in such a positive way.
Many of us have access to technology
that allows us to suppress performance fear, anxiety:
beta blockers, anti-anxiety medications as well as other drugs are available to us
regardless of having any sort of pre-existing anxiety disorder
and allow us to suppress the physical amalgamations of fear.
This doesn't seem that harmful, but this is only the beginning.
Recent breakthroughs within the field of optogenetics
have hinted at the attainability of technology to override fear.
Now, for those of you who don't really know what I'm talking about here,
we've never had a class with Professor Zimmer.
Optogenetics roughly is a neuromodulation technique
that uses optics and genetics to monitor neurons in living tissue.
It's a lot, I know - and essentially, from what I know,
it's being used in attempts to cure blindness.
And what these scientists have found at UC Berkeley, University of Columbia,
and Salk Institute among other institutions,
is that through their experiments on mice,
they have found that they are able
to harness and shut off the part of the brain that dictates fear.
This is pretty intimidating stuff, especially when you realize
that private military companies and private defense contractors
are doing similar research.
Alleviating PTSD and alleviating childhood trauma is one thing,
but creating a fearless soldier, or a fearless citizen for that matter,
does not bode well.
What these two types of technologies share
as well as countless others
is this ability to block out a natural human process.
For those of us who don't rely on medication on a day to day basis,
having this magic button or magic pill to provide us with short-term comfort,
actually denies us this highly useful long-term development.
As an athlete, I tend to experience muscle soreness
after particularly strenuous physical workouts.
After tearing the muscle tissue
specifically, the micro fibers within the tissue during this training sessions,
our bodies then begin this process of tissue reconstruction
making us fitter, stronger,
and able to perform at a higher ability than before.
And in much the same way,
the process of engaging one's fears is overwhelmingly positive,
but like the tearing of muscle tissue,
it has to happen in order to achieve something greater.
When we use these man-made technologies,
we also lose some of the very positive aspects of fear.
Many artists use and draw their creativity,
and their fears, and anxieties.
JD Salinger, Beethoven, Franz Kafka, Emily Dickinson,
David Bowie among many others
have reflected their internal fear and trauma in their art;
yet, at the same time, their artwork and their masterpieces
point towards this acceptance of difficult circumstances,
and it is that reason why we know these people
for their masterpieces and not for their fear.
And in much the same way, if you look at the list of individuals behind me,
you and I will both probably agree
that society would define these people as successful,
but if we look at the way
in which these individuals attained their success,
then society would label them as failures, as lost.
All of the people on this list failed to go to college,
dropped out of college, or couldn't go to college
because of extenuating circumstances.
But this is not the myth of the American Dream.
This is patience, creativity, this is passion,
this is harnessing one's fears.
Every time we actively engage in our fears,
we create these neurological connections and associations
that make us a stronger, more resilient person.
Having these fears and anxieties in our lives
puts us in this constant state of change
allowing us to actually change the structure and the trajectory
of our lives for the better, for something more solid.
Every day that we live
and positively interact their fears and our anxieties
is a day when we can create,
and we can reach for our greatest potential,
yet, and it is in this way, that fear can truly set us free.
So today, I challenge all students here
whether you have 30 days left of college or three years,
whether you know exactly
what you want to do with the rest of your life
or you are just barely beginning to scratch the surface of your interests;
I challenge you to let go,
to take a step back and appreciate your self-established potential,
to catch a glimpse of the bigger picture.
I challenge you to throw off
the preconceived notions that have been projected on you,
to push them aside, and to choose the life path and the lifestyle
that works for you in your own time.
Engage your fears, your anxieties, your indecisions
and know that the journey to overcome them is far more important than the end result.
Society may tell us that fearless is perfect,
but we know that's just not so.
We who face these inner battles
are neither flawed nor week, neither broken nor compromised;
we are not backwards, we are not unfriendly,
we are not failures, and above all, we are not lost.
And no one should ever tell you otherwise.
Thank you.
(Applause)