0:00

Commencement Speeches for the Class of twenty is

0:02

a production of I Heart Radio. Class

0:11

of Parents, Faculty,

0:14

rising graduates, Welcome to commencement.

0:17

You made it. This

0:21

year is a little different, a difficult

0:24

time to graduate because the traditional

0:26

graduation day has been put on hold. So

0:29

we're bringing it to you wherever

0:31

you are, because this is still your

0:33

day, your moment. And

0:35

now put your hands together. It's time

0:37

to be inspired. This year's commencement speaker

0:40

the one and only Aaron Manky. Possibility.

0:55

That's a word that must be on your mind these days.

0:57

You've studied for a very long time, you

1:00

focused and learned and grown

1:02

as a student and as a

1:04

human being. After all of that,

1:06

you can't help but feel as if you are full

1:09

of possibility. But

1:12

then the uncertainty creeps in like

1:14

a shadow that chases away the sunlight.

1:17

Uncertainty in your options, in

1:19

your potential, and how ready

1:21

the world is to receive you and give

1:23

you a small little slice to call your own.

1:26

Everyone has doubts, and everyone

1:28

battles with feeling like an impostor. But

1:31

all of that probably feels magnified

1:33

these days, in these uncertain

1:36

times. When

1:38

I was a kid, my mom took me to a

1:40

local store to buy a new toy.

1:43

Now, I grew up in the eighties, so most

1:45

of those shopping trips were focused on things like

1:47

transformers, g I Joe, and

1:49

ThunderCats. But this trip

1:52

was different. We were there to

1:54

buy a kite. I

1:56

remember the ride home. I had

1:58

picked one of the many cheap plastic kites

2:01

that were available, printed with the golden

2:03

brown eagle. At least that's what

2:05

the package said. I still needed to

2:07

assemble it, and

2:09

the moment we got home, that's exactly

2:11

what I did. Now, kites

2:14

are a funny object. They are full

2:16

of, for lack of a better term,

2:18

possibility. Just looking at

2:20

the golden Eagle on my bedroom floor,

2:22

I knew that it was designed to soar over

2:25

the neighborhood. Those wings that

2:27

frame, the four ft long

2:29

roll of string about the size of a pocket

2:31

knife, all of it screamed possibility.

2:35

But there was a whole lot of uncertainty

2:37

too. Who was I to try

2:39

and fly this magnificent plastic

2:42

device. Why did I believe that I

2:44

could do it when I had never done it before?

2:47

And what if it crashed? What if

2:49

it broke? What if even taking

2:51

a chance meant failing and

2:53

never getting another shot again. I

2:57

remember all of those emotions, but

2:59

I also remember pushing them aside and

3:02

doing it anyway, because the thrill

3:04

was in the attempt. Right to do

3:06

something, even poorly, was infinitely

3:09

more enjoyable than to just sit in fear

3:11

and never know if it was possible, And

3:14

the same can be said for the rest of life.

3:16

If you never try, you will never

3:18

have a chance to succeed. This

3:22

is probably a bad time to tell you that I

3:24

don't use my college degrees. I

3:26

have a few of them in unrelated fields,

3:29

and those are fields I don't work in. That

3:31

was the plan, of course, But plans

3:34

are rough sketches drawn over life

3:36

with pencil, and every twist and

3:38

turn in your adventure requires making

3:40

corrections and adjustments or

3:42

going back to the drawing board Entirely.

3:46

I'm not suggesting that your plans are worth

3:48

pursuing. It's just that, well,

3:51

life is messy. So one minute

3:53

you might be earning a degree in psychology

3:56

and the next year producing one of the top

3:58

history podcasts and world And

4:01

that's okay, because success isn't

4:03

always found in defiantly sticking

4:05

to the plan, no matter how many curveballs

4:07

life throws at you. Sometimes success

4:10

is just learning how to learn, how

4:12

to be flexible and how to see a door

4:14

where there should only be a wall. I

4:17

haven't always been a podcaster, and

4:19

I never saw this coming down the road, believe

4:22

me, But I did have a dream.

4:24

It was a simple and honest one,

4:26

I guess, and it never got in the way of my

4:28

professional life. Since the

4:30

age of ten, I've written stories,

4:33

and while I often wondered where that hobby

4:35

would lead me, I didn't let the uncertainty

4:38

stopped me from testing the possibilities.

4:42

When I created Lore, the podcast

4:45

I'm best known for, the one that was adapted

4:47

for TV and published as a book series,

4:49

and all of the fun adventures that it

4:52

has allowed. I was on the edge

4:54

of quitting, but I took a chance

4:56

on an old dream, and somehow,

4:58

against all odds, it worked

5:01

out. Ever since,

5:03

I've been asked the very same question by a lot

5:05

of people, how did you do that? How

5:07

did you make the leap and find all

5:09

those successes? And for

5:11

a very long time I gave the same answer

5:13

to each of them. I have no

5:16

idea, honestly,

5:18

So much of what I've done over the last few years

5:20

has been me making things up as

5:23

I go, learning on the job,

5:25

trying, failing, and trying again.

5:28

Although now that I think about it, that's

5:31

just life in general, isn't it. Because

5:34

at the end of the day, things like your

5:36

class rank or the type of degree you'll

5:38

be able to claim, those things aren't

5:41

as important as the bigger message of

5:43

graduation. You have proven

5:45

that you can learn, that you can adapt

5:47

and work through challenges, that

5:50

you can master something if required.

5:54

But still I don't know how to

5:56

teach other people to do what I did

5:58

with lore. But having been asked about

6:00

it over the years, and having done a lot of thinking

6:02

about it, one truth started

6:04

to float to the surface. Some

6:06

things are controllable and

6:09

some things aren't. And it

6:11

all goes back to kites. Just

6:13

about everything that you will do in life is

6:15

like flying a kite. Think about

6:17

the entire process from start to finish.

6:20

If you want your kite to soar over the neighborhood,

6:23

high up there in the sky, then you

6:25

need to do some work. You need to build

6:27

the kite, of course, to assemble those

6:29

pieces and get it into the right shape.

6:33

Then you need to go outside and run

6:35

around in your yard or the neighborhood

6:37

park, dragging the kite behind you.

6:40

Then the wind steps in, lifts those

6:42

plastic wings and takes your kite

6:44

into the air. And everyone

6:46

wants their kite to sore. They

6:48

want their book published, or to advance

6:51

in their career, or to launch

6:53

a hit podcast. Dreams are

6:55

wonderful and all of us have them.

6:59

But at the end of the day, you can't control

7:01

every aspect of your dream.

7:03

There will always be parts of it, sometimes

7:06

even essential pieces, that will

7:08

be out of your control, and that will

7:10

feel frustrating and discouraging. I

7:12

know, and for a lot of people, the

7:14

tendency is to just give up, to

7:17

let go of the controllables and stop

7:19

dreaming. And flying a kite is

7:21

a mix of those elements. You

7:23

can control building it, you can

7:25

control getting outside, and

7:28

you can control running around trying

7:30

to get it into the air. But you

7:32

can't control the wind, can you.

7:34

You can't predict it, or command it

7:37

or manipulate it like a video game to

7:39

do what you want. The wind either

7:41

shows up or it doesn't,

7:45

So giving up on flying a kite means

7:47

going home and taking your kite apart. But

7:49

if you're not outside dragging that kite

7:51

behind you as you run through the park. Then

7:54

you'll never be ready for when the wind does

7:56

show up if you don't maintain

7:58

the controllables, and you'll never be

8:00

able to take advantage of the uncontrollables

8:03

when they arrive. For

8:05

me, I could control writing.

8:08

I showed up every day and made my

8:10

thing. I put it out there, and

8:12

I dragged it around behind me. All

8:14

of those things were within my control, and

8:17

I never stopped doing them. The

8:19

rest most people would

8:22

probably call it luck. One

8:24

day, the wind just arrived

8:26

and it took the kites I had built, the one

8:28

that I was already in the park pulling behind

8:31

me, and it launched it into the air. We

8:34

can't control the uncontrollable,

8:36

but we can certainly be ready when it

8:38

finds us. I

8:41

don't know what your future holds. In

8:43

a lot of ways, I don't think you do, either, But

8:46

I think we can all agree that it's going to be a mixture

8:48

of possibility and uncertainty,

8:51

and that at the end of the day, what

8:53

matters most is that you try,

8:56

you learn, you grow, you

8:58

adapt and rise to meet new

9:00

challenges, and that you never

9:02

stopped building your kite dragging

9:05

it around waiting for

9:07

the wind to blow. You

9:20

can find a collection of incredible commencement

9:22

addresses from all your favorite speakers at the

9:24

Commencement Podcast on I Heart Radio or

9:26

wherever you listen to podcasts.