[0:00]I am so proud of each and every one of you. We are here today because every single one of you stood tall and said yes we can. Yes we can learn. Yes we can succeed. You decided you would not be defined by where you come from, but but by where you want to go. By what you want to achieve, by the dreams you hope to fulfill. For we gather here tonight in times when the very foundations of our lives, the old order has been shaken. The old ideas and institutions have crumbled and a new generation is called upon to remake the world. And let me be clear when I say young I'm not just referring to the date of your birth certificate. I'm talking about an approach to life, a quality of mind and a quality of heart. We need people like you to step up. We need your daring. We need your enthusiasm. We need your energy. We need your imagination. A willingness to follow your passions regardless of whether they lead to fortune and faint. A willingness to question conventional wisdom and rethink old dogmas. A lack of regard for all the traditional markers of status and prestige. And in a instead to doing what's meaningful to you. What helps others? What makes a difference in this world? Were engaged in two wars and a struggle against terrorism. The threats of climate change, nuclear proliferation, and pandemic defy national boundaries and easy solutions. For many of you, these challenges are also felt in more personal terms. Perhaps you're still looking for a job. You're struggling to figure out what career path makes sense. Now, in the face of these challenges, it may be tempting to fall back on the formulas for success that have been peddled so frequently in recent years. It goes something like this, we too often let the external, the material things serve as indicators that we're doing well even though something inside us tells us that we're not doing our best, that we're avoiding that which is hard but also necessary that that we're shrinking from rather than rising to the challenges of the age. And the thing is, in this new hyper competitive age, none of us, none of us can afford to be complacent. That's true whatever profession you choose. Professors might earn the distinction of tenure, but that doesn't guarantee that they'll keep putting in the long hours and late nights and have the passion and the drive to be great educators. The same principle is true in your personal life. Being a parent is not just a matter of paying the bills, doing the bare minimum. It's not just bringing a child in the world that matters, but the acts of love and sacrifice it takes to raise and educate that child and give them opportunity. I'm standing here as president because the education that I received. I know it's not always easy to do well in school. I know a lot of you have challenges in your lives right now. I get it. I know what it's like. My father left my family when I was two years old. And I was raised by a single mom who had to work and who struggled at times to pay the bills and wasn't always able to give us the things that other kids had. There were times when I missed having a father in my life. There were times when I was lonely and I felt like I didn't fit in. So I wasn't always as focused as I should have been on school. And I did some things that I'm not proud of and I got in more trouble than I should have. And my life could have easily taken a turn for the worst. But my mother, my grandparents, they pushed me to excel. But I was lucky. I got a lot of second chances. And I had the opportunity to go to college and law school and follow my dreams. You can't let the past get you down. You have to let it motivate you. Every body here has got a unique story like that to tell. Each of you knows what it took for you to get here. But in reaching this milestone, there's a common lesson shared by every graduate in this hall. It's not where you are or what you are. It's who you are. Because life will throw some things at you. Truth is not a single one of the graduates here today has had as easy. Not a single one of you had anything handed to you on a silver platter. You had to work for it. You had to earn it. Most of all, you had to believe in yourselves. Yes, you've always been underdogs.
[5:29]Nobody's handed you a thing. But that also means that whatever you accomplish in your life, you will have earned it. Whatever rewards and joys you reap, you'll appreciate them that much more because they will have come through your own sweat and tears. Products of your own effort and your own talents. You've shown more grit and determination in your childhoods than a lot of adults ever will. That's who you are. We need everyone to broaden their ideas about what is possible. We need parents, politicians, and the media to see how success is possible. How success is happening every day. So that's why I came here today. Because if success can happen here. You have everything you need to get started. You've got no excuses. You have no excuses not to change the world. Did you study business? Go start a company. Or why not help a struggling not for profit find better and more effective ways to serve folks in need? You study nursing? Go under staff clinics and hospitals across this country are desperate for your help. You study education. Teach in a high need school where the kids really need you. Give a chance to kids who can't, who can't get everything they need maybe in their neighborhood, maybe not even their home but we can't afford to give up on them. Prepare them to compete for any job anywhere in the world. You study engineering, help us lead a green revolution. Developing new sources of clean energy that will power our economy and preserve our planet. Find somebody to be successful for. Raise their hopes. Rise to their needs. That's what's made a difference in our lives and it's going to make an even greater difference in your lives.
[7:37]Not just for your own success because we live in a new world now. The hard road does not end here. Your journey has just begun. It won't protect you against every setback or challenge or mistake. You'll make some, I promise. You're going to have to keep working hard. You're going to have to keep pushing yourselves and you'll find yourself sometime in situations where folks have had an easier time. They're a little bit ahead of you and you're going to have to work harder than there and you may be frustrated by that. You may have setbacks and you may have failures but you're not done. You're not even getting started. And if you ever forget that just look to history. Colonel Sanders didn't open up his first Kentucky Fried Chicken till he was in the sixties. Winston Churchill was dismissed as little more than a has been who enjoyed Scotch a little bit too much before he took over as Prime Minister and saw Great Britain through its finest hour. When you read a great story or you learn about an important moment in history, it helps you imagine what it would be like to walk in somebody else's shoes.
[8:50]To know their struggles. Each of them at one point in their life didn't have any title or much status to speak of. But they had passion. A commitment to following that passion wherever it would lead. And to working hard every step along the way. But if you push yourselves. If you build on what you've already accomplished here, then I couldn't be more confident about your futures. I'm hopeful and I'm excited about what all of you can achieve. And I know that armed with the skills and experience and the love that you've gained, you're ready to make your mark on the world. So thank you. Thanks for inspiring me. I know starting your careers in trouble times is a challenge but it is also a privilege because it's moments like these that force us to try harder and dig deeper and to discover gifts we never knew we had. To find the greatness that lies within each of us so don't ever shy away from that endeavor. I can promise that you will be the better for that continued effort. Congratulations. God bless you.
