The following is a portion of the speech delivered by Brooks Secondary School principal Jasmin Marshman during a qathet School District graduation ceremony on June 7:
Your past 13 years have been leading to this moment; you are all stepping off the cliff and you are ready. But let’s be clear. You don’t have to have it all figured out right now. You don’t even have to have a dream.
If you have something you’ve always wanted to do, go for it. But if like many, you don’t have a dream, don’t force it. Instead, focus on passionate dedication in the pursuit of short term goals.
Be micro-ambitious, put your head down and work with pride on whatever is in front of you. You never know where you’ll end up when you lift your head and look up.
If you focus too far in front of you, you won’t see the shiny thing out of the corner of your eye. You do not need to already know what you want to do with the rest of your life.
Life will sometimes seem long, tough and tiring, and you will sometimes be happy and sometimes sad. There is only one thing to do with this amazing, magical, existence: fill it.
Life is best filled with learning about as much as you can, taking pride in whatever you are doing, having compassion, sharing ideas, being enthusiastic, and all the other stuff like love, travel, art and music, maybe a spouse, maybe kids, and maybe mountain climbing.
It’s an incredible exciting thing, this wonderous life of yours, and you are right at the starting line. I’m very grateful that when I looked up, I saw this opportunity, because you are the shiny thing that caught my eye.
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