Plus, in case anyone is holding Power's "Hillary Clinton is a monster" comment against her, I invite you to give her a second chance. Hillary's recent heartless insinuation that she is staying in the presidential race in case Obama is assassinated a la Bobby Kennedy helps to at least show where Power is coming from.
The video can be viewed via Pitzer's website.
As I look back to my original post, I'm embarrassed by the ways I attempted to characterize some of the main points of her speech, especially now that I have the original text, as made available at
The Huffington Post, to compare it to. Below are two of my favorite passages:
Focus on the next thing, and take some of the pressure off finding the eventual thing. Emphasize the substance of what you will learn, not the status of what you will be called. Ask yourself, "What will I take away from this? Will I learn a new skill? A new town? A new mindset?" Put one foot in front of the other for as long as you can afford to, rather than trying to map your way to the winner's platform.
----------------------------
Last weekend I attended a conference in honor of a Nobel Prize winning Princeton psychologist named Danny Kahneman. Kahneman is a remarkable scholar who has done groundbreaking experiments which showed the ways in which humans are not as rational as had long been assumed. At the conference, which celebrated his retirement, lawyers, economists, and psychologists got up to present work that had been galvanized or influenced by his theories. The day was a tour de force, a monument to the kind of impact one man and his ideas can have on the world. At the end of the day Kahneman was asked what he was most likely to be remembered for. The audience hushed in anticipation. Here Kahneman would elevate one of his many theories above the rest. Posterity would record which experimental research the great Kahneman himself thought most landmark. "The one thing that I'm sure of," he said, "is that I'll be forgotten." But he was next asked the source of his nearly unrivalled professional success. Again the scholars in the room waited expectantly. This time, he gave them a response they could take home, answering, "my choice of friends."
The beauty of this is that, while much in this life is beyond our control, all of us hold the power to choose our friends. We can each be a Nobel prize winner at friendship. None of us are perfect friends always, but one way to think about friendship is in terms of carefulness. Be careful with those you love. And surround yourself with people who are careful with you.
Looking back, a lot of the same criticisms that are hurled at Senator Obama could apply to Power as well. In a way, she is relying heavily on feel-good cliches and truisms to boost morale and gain favor. As an increasing cynic over the past eight years, however, I'm pretty excited to have people I have faith in get me excited about the state of the world again. If these sentiments are indeed garbage that anyone could be saying, how come no one else is saying them?
For the first time in a long time, as far as politics go, I actually have some hope. Admittedly, that's all it is, hope, but at least I have some. As I see it, there's a chance that some positive change could arise from an Obama administration. I'm not convinced; I'm not even willing to bet on it. But I do see a chance, and that chance it so much more promising than what we've faced in the previous decade.
While we're hoping, here's hoping that Obama realigns with Power if he has the opportunity to build a cabinet.
No comments:
Post a Comment