relatives, friends, uh - I'm deeply moved and I'm profoundly grateful to be here. Uh

- this is a wonderful moment in everyone's life and

I'm going to take just a brief moment of - personal time to say its doubly wonderful

for me because not only is my wife here but my

son - and his wife and my two little grand daughters - ages 8 and 6. CLAPPING...are

here and uh you guys know who I mean right? Ok good.

And I just want to say a word about them because I have been thinking about them in the

Naropa context. So - two years ago my wife and I were - in Golden and we were hiking

in the foothills with - Nia then 6 years old and Kiara age 4 at the time. And Nia was -

they both were hiking barefoot up these rocky trails and I finally asked Nia how can you

do that - it just - it hurts me to just watch you - walk this terrain barefoot. And she

very quickly and instinctively said well I'm a

nature girl - nature loves me and I love nature except for the spiky parts! LAUGHING.

At which point Kiara then 4 - wanted to say something about herself and she said and

grandpa I'm a vegetarian except for bacon. LAUGHING.

So my sense is that these two fit the Naropa vibe - would you agree?

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And I'm going - I have schedule visits with the admissions department for both of them

right after - right after this uh - this ceremony.

I'm honored to be here, but my true honor is that I get to share this important moment

in the lives of the lass of 2015.

A deep bow to all of you. And a deep bow also - to the friends and family and relatives

and strangers and the staff and the faculty and administration of Naropa University who

have helped you come to this day.

Naropa is a very special place. I think some of you know - that the contemplative

teaching and learning movement is now getting traction in higher education around the

country. It's slow but its coming. Coming to an extent one could not have imagined 40

years ago - when this university was founded. Let alone even 30 or 20 years ago. And

Naropa has planted those seeds. Uh this is a greenery of something that is now growing.

Our task is to let the world know where the greenery is uh so let's try to do that. Get

- get the - CLAPPING - get the word out. I have

tried to be your emissary - I want to do that on into the future because I think what happens

here is a very important contribution not only to you as individuals but to higher education

and to the world - at large.

I have two modest graduation gifts for the class of 2015. I wish I had more to offer

- but for now this.

The first is 6 brief suggestions about the road ahead of you. And the second is a promise

to stop talking in about 12 minutes so that you can get on that road. CHEERING

Sooner rather than later.

My first suggestion is simple - be reckless when it comes to affairs of the heart.

All right. CHEERING

Now since half of you misinterpreted that I'm - LAUGHING --

It's true I was - I spent the 60s in Berkeley, but I am 76 now and uh - there may be snow

on the roof but there is still a fire in the furnace. What I -- CHEERING!

Anybody know CPR - I don't know. LAUGHING

What I really mean parents and grandparents...

Is be passionate. Fall madly in love with life. Be passionate about some part of the

natural and or human worlds and take risks on its behalf no matter how vulnerable they

make you. No one ever died saying I'm sure glad for the self centered, self serving and

self protective life I lived. LAUGHING

Offer yourself to the world. Your energies, your gifts, your vision, your heart with open

hearted generosity, but understand that when you live that way you will soon learn how

little you know and how easy it is to fail - to grow and love in service you, I, all

of us must value ignorance as much as knowledge

and failure as much as success.

I know this is ironic advice on graduation day.

But clinging to what you already know and do well - is the path to an unlived life.

So cultivate beginners mind. Walk straight into

your not knowing and take the risk of failing and falling again and again then getting up

again and again to learn.

That's the path to a life lived large in service of love, truth and justice.

Second, as you integrate ignorance and failure into your knowledge and success. Do the

same with all the alien parts of yourself. Take everything that's bright and beautiful

in you and introduce it to the shadow side of

yourself.

Let your altruism meet your egotism.

Let your generosity meet your greed.

Let your joy meet your grief. Everyone has a shadow even Buddhists, even Quakers -

even high-minded people like us. Especially high-minded people like us. CLAPPING

But when you are able to say I am all of the above - my shadow as well as my light - the

shadow's power is put in service of the good.

Wholeness is the goal that wholeness does not mean perfection. It means embracing

brokenness as an integral part of your life.

As a person who as Jerry said - has made three deep dives - into depression a long the

way. I do not speak lightly of this.

I simply know that it is true.

As you acknowledge and embrace all that you are - you give yourself a gift that will

benefit the rest of us as well.

Our world is in desperate need of leaders who live what Socrates called an examined

life.

In critical areas like politics, religion, business and the mass media - too many leaders

refuse to name and claim their shadows because they don't want to look weak.

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With shadows that go unexamined and unchecked - they use power heedlessly in ways

that harm countless people and undermine public trust in our major institutions. If you

value self-knowledge - you will become the leaders we need to help renew the society.

But if for some reason and I doubt that there is anyone like this here - if for some reason

you chose to live an unexamined life after you leave this place - I beg of you - do not

take a job that involves other people. LAUGHING

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Third, and critically important - as you welcome whatever you find alien within yourself

- extend that same welcome to whatever you find alien in the outer world. I don't know

any virtue more important these days than hospitality to the stranger. To those we

perceive as other than us.

The old majority in this society - people who look like me is on its way out. By 20

- yes...

By 2045 - the majority of Americans will be people of color.

CHEERING

The sad fact is that many in the old majority fear that fact and their fear - their fear

shamelessly manipulated by too many politicians is bringing us down.

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The renewal this nation needs will not come from people who are afraid of otherness and

race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation. CLAPPING

Its because of that fear that our once vital society is grid locked and stagnant and our

main hope for renewal is diversity welcomed and embraced. I recently met a professor on

a visit to Southern California who had left a prestigious institution predominantly white

to teach undocumented youth in Southern California. I asked him how it was going and

he said best move I ever made - my previous students felt entitled and demanded to be

entertained.

My undocumented students are hungry to learn, hardworking and courageous enough to

keep moving out of their comfort zones.

America will be renewed by people with these qualities.

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And if we - if we - who have privilege and power will welcome them, collaborate with

them and help remove the obstacles in their way - 2045 will be a year of great promise

for all of us.

Fourth, take on big jobs worth doing. Jobs like the spread of love, peace and justice.

That means refusing to be seduced by our cultural obsession with being effective as

measured by short term results.

We all want our work to make a difference, but if we take on the big jobs - and our only

measure of success is next quarter's bottom line - we will end up disappointed, dropping

out and in disappear.

Think of someone you respect because he or she lived a life devoted to high values. Or

Rosa Parks or Nelson Mandela or someone known only to a few.

At the end of the road was that person able to say I am sure glad I devoted my life to

that job - because now everyone in the world can

check it off their to do lists forever and ever.

No, our heroes take on impossible jobs and stay with them for the long haul because they

live by a standard that trumps effectiveness. The name of that standard I think is

faithfulness. Faithfulness to your gifts, faithfulness to your perception of the needs

of the world and faithfulness to offering your gifts

to whatever needs are within your reach.

The tighter we cling to the norm of the effectiveness, the smaller the tasks we'll take on

because they are the only ones that get short-term results. Public education is a tragic

example.

We in this country no longer care about educating children. A big job that's never done.

We care only about getting kids to pass tests with measurable results.

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And we care about that - whether or not or without even considering whether they

measure anything that matters. In the process we are crushing the spirits of a lot of good

teachers and vulnerable kids. Care about being effective of course. But care even more

about being faithful as countless teachers do. Faithful to your calling. And to the true

needs of those entrusted to your care.

You won't get the big jobs done in your lifetime, but if at the end of the day you can say -

I was faithful - I think you will be ok. CLAPPING

Fifth, since suffering I don't need to tell this to Buddhists - I just didn't know you

could have so much fun. That's all I didn't know.

Since suffering as well as joy comes with being human I urge you to remember this -- violence

is what happens when we don't know what else to do with our suffering. Violence

is what happens when we don't know what else to do with our suffering.

Sometimes we aim that violence at ourselves as in overwork that leads to burn our or

worse. Or in the many forms of substance abuse. Sometimes we aim that violence at

other people. Racism, sexism and homophobia often come from people trying to relieve

their suffering by claiming superiority over others.

The good news is that suffering can be transformed into something that brings life not

death. It happens every day.

I am 76 years old. I now know many people who have suffered the loss of the dearest

person in their lives.

At first they go into deep grief certain that their lives will never again be worth living.

But then they slowly awaken to the fact that not in spite of their loss but because of

it. They've become bigger, more compassionate

people with more capacity of heart to take in other people's sorrows and joys.

These are broken hearted people, but their hearts have been broken open rather than

broken apart.

So every day exercise your heart by taking in life's little pains and joys. That kind

of exercise will make your heart supple the way

a runner makes a muscle supple. So that when it breaks and it surely will - it will

break not into a fragment grenade, but into a

greater capacity for love.

Sixth, and finally I quote St. Benedict - not a Buddhist but still worth quoting. Who said

daily keep your death before your eyes.

That may sound like a morbid practice but as I think you know it isn't - if you hold

a healthy awareness of your own mortality - your

eyes will be opened to the grandeur and glory of life.

And that will evoke all of the virtues I have named as well as those I haven't.

Such as hope, generosity and gratitude.

If the unexamined life is not worth living - its equally true that the unlived life is

not worth examining.

So I'll close - with this brief quote from a great writer - Diane Ackerman - who reminds

us to live - truly live our lives.

And I quote:

"The great affair - the love affair with life is to live as variously as possible. To groom

one's curiosity like a high-spirited thoroughbred - climb aboard and gallop over the thick

sun struck hills everyday.

Where there is no risk - the emotional terrain is flat and unyielding and despite all its

dimensions, valleys, pinnacles and detours - life will seem to have none of its magnificent

geography - only a lynx. It began in mystery and it will end in mystery - but what a

savage and beautiful country lies between.

Once again, a deep bow to the class of 2015 to each and every one of you - traveling

mercies and blessings - as you make the journey from one mystery to the next and the

next and the next.

CLAPPING