Ah, graduation time.
A time for young people to cast off their high school chains and move on into the chains of adulthood.
In honour of that, I present my sagely advise to grads everywhere.
1. Your high school faults and labels do not matter anymore.
As soon as you throw that cap in the air, do not worry about those high school mistakes. Never forget the lessons learned from them, but do not let them hinder your life outside those four judgemental walls.
It does get better.
2. The learning never stops.
It does not matter what you do after high school, the 18-year-old brain has not even begun to take in all the knowledge the world possesses.
Do not think that you are no longer required, to learn just because you have left the classroom.
Learn about people. Learn about places. Learn skills. Learn useless yet still interesting facts that will amaze your coffee date.
Just learn.
3. Make the world pay you for passion.
Upon graduation day, you will finally have to act on that age old of question of what you want to be when you grow up.
Whether they were said by Marc Anthony or Confucius, the internet cannot seem to tell me which, one of them said, “choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”
The hours turn into minutes during a job you hate so you might as well find something that you enjoy to do and the minutes will pass by like hours.
Finding said job may take awhile and you will have to work in jobs you hate in order to make that vital thing called money. However, whether you spend forever in a job you hate or a job you love is up to you.
4. Be tolerant of people.
For this little nugget of truth, I turn to Zootopia:
“Real life is messy. We all have limitations. We all make mistakes. Which means, hey, glass half full, we all have a lot in common.”
We are all human.
We are all different and yet still so similar in so many ways.
You do not have to like everyone you meet, but if we were to offer everyone just that little bit of respect and courtesy, in our own small ways, we can make the world a better place.
5. Welcome to the time of existential crises.
For the past 13 years, you have had one goal in life; make it through high school.
Now you have an endless stream of possibilities available to you.
Now what?
You will wonder if you are on the right path. You will wonder what your purpose is in life.
Since the day you were born you were both two things; in the grand scheme of things you are small and insignificant but in the world that surrounds you, you can also make a difference.
Now that you are an adult, remember to not take yourself too seriously and yet still know that you are able to make an impact in your surrounding world.
In the words of Monty Python, here is the meaning of life:
“Well, it’s nothing very special. Uh, try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.”
Now go out into the world and be awesome.
Congratulations graduates of 2017.
