Good Or Bad, I Was One Of The Ones

I go through this every year. The season is up and coming and soon the pictures on social media will flood with proud parents sharing their photographs from their child’s graduation.
I am not one to rain on this parade and nor am I someone who does not appreciate this accomplishment.
I do love this time of year.
I love the ideas of prom and the thoughts of what it might have been like if I had gone to one.

I want you to know that I am putting this out there for you.
I am putting this out into the Universe and letting these words go wherever they can, and I do this with hopes that they will find whoever needs them.
Mainly you.
And, of course, the old saying applies, which means, “If it don’t apply, then let it fly.”
Therefore, do not own what does not belong to you.

I see you standing proudly in your school colors, a cap and a gown, smiling huge for the cameras and standing shoulder to shoulder next to your childhood friends.
I see you and your curiosities, and I cherish this for you.
Perhaps, I cherish this more than you cherish this moment for yourself.
I see you this way because I never had the chance to see anything like this before.

You are beautiful, exactly as you are.
There are countless things that are about to unfold. There is a new life that is out there and just waiting for you.
And you are going to meet new people.
And you are going to see new things.
you are going to encounter greatness and casualties and everything on both sides of the spectrum.

The world is going to unfold in ways that you never assumed and life will make changes, friends will change, and so will you.
This is part of life’s natural order.
We grow and we search. We seek and we find and oftentimes, we circle back to realize that we had far more than we believed.

I see you there, standing proudly with your family.
I see your smile which s bigger and brighter than the sun.
But this is you.
You always smile big and pretty for pictures.
I know.
I know that life is happening. And I know there is always something more “behind the scenes,” and in most cases, no one knows, no one sees, and perhaps no one understands.
This is not to say that I know or that I “get it” and I understand.
But I understand enough to know that life happens to everyone and the only truly inclusive thing in life is the fact that no one gets out of this place alive.
So, live it up!
Make your mark on this world and carve your name wherever you go.

I know that friends are a funny bunch. I know that had I not grown up with some of my old friends, they and I would never get alone in any other circumstance. Yet, I still love them because I still grew up with them. Some I still speak with. Some I have warm regards for. Some I have let go and some I have chosen to love from a distance to save my own sanity and keep myself from heartache.
I know that no matter where we go in life or how far we move away; no matter how old we grow or how long it’s been, —no one ever forgets the kids from the neighborhood.

I still remember my bike rides through the town.
I remember some of the fights I saw at Prospect Park.
I remember the late nights and the wild nights and the crazy things we did.
I understand that the ideas of being crazy are all relative and subjective.
But we all go a little crazy sometimes.
At least, I think we should –
Go crazy, I mean.

I stand before you, perhaps an older man but I am a changed man, nonetheless.
I am old in some regards, but I am younger now than ever before.
I think that you have empowered my inner-youth by watching you perform because this has allowed me to reconnect with old dreams that went dormant for way too long.

I am free to see things on my own now.
I am free to realize that I am not limited to my previous assumptions.
Or more, I am free to realize that my limitations are nothing more than an imaginary ceiling, and, so. I am free to burst through that membrane and surpass any of my limitations, so long as I choose to.

My wishes for you are simple and they come without any strings or hooks or reasons for reciprocation.

I want you to go and see and do.
I once learned about the 4 L’s, which are the way you live, love, laugh, and learn.
Anything that affects your 4 L’s affects your mental health.

I was told about the three most empowering words of all:
Go, be, do.
I love those words, though I never dared when I was younger.
I was afraid to go or be or do.
I was afraid to try in fear that my words would either come out wrong or that I would appear stupid and hence, I would have to face rejection or believe that I am unwanted or undesired.

I was afraid to let go of my comforts; and this included the uncomfortable comforts, which i held because hey, at least I knew about the demons I danced with. At least I knew why the caged bird sang.
I was afraid of the unknown or the up-close and unforeseeable future.
What now?
Who will I be if I am not who I was before?
Meanwhile, who was I before now?
Who was anyone before they woke up and realized that something was missing?

I was afraid to go, be, or do.

I see you now and the world ahead of you.
You have your life to live and no one can do this for you.
No one can live for you.
No one can learn for you.
No one can see for you
No one can understand or realize for you.
These are your tasks.

No one can feel what you feel or see what you see and for you, my wish is that you go, be, do, see, feel, live, love, laugh and learn.
Do this, always.

I see you with admiration and my envy exists only because I never dared.
I never saw the world the way you see it.
I never had the chances or the advantages, which is not to say that I did not have any.
No, more accurately, I took too much for granted and saw too little and learned too late.

I never had the chance to stand beneath the sunshine on the football field of my high school, standing proudly with lifelong friends, all of us cheery and starry-eyed and some of us preparing to go off to college while all of us prepared for a summer we would never forget.

I think of the way names are announced and students walk across a stage to accept their diplomas.
I think of the bittersweetness a parent feels as they watch this kind of accomplishment.
What a gift. . .

I think about the young high school sweethearts and the summer loves which are about to come.
I think about the freedom that comes when class is dismissed and the engine starts a new car which is designed to take you anywhere.
I think about the late nights and summer days on the beach with a world ahead.
I think about the feeling of the wind in your hair and the sound of the waves, the gulls crying, and the world around you is a brand-new penny, shiny as ever, as if to be fresh from the mint.

I want the world for you more than I want the world for myself.
I want you to venture forward without fear.
I want you to be brave enough to try new things and meet new people.
I want you to be brave enough to see the world with an open mind and leave your insecurities behind you.
I want you to dance the dance and feel the music.
Try new foods.
Try new tricks.
See the world, please, I beg this for you.

I know the world is big.
I know that I never dared or tried to step from my comfort zone.
And yes, there is much that I wished I had seen.
There are things I wished I tried and places I wished I visited.

There are times when my fears tell me that time has run out and that I missed my window.
Please. Do not let this be you.
Go. BE. Do.
Live. Love. Laugh. And Learn.

I imagine you now.
The month of June ends with your cap and gown.
Your future is bright, just like the sunshine that celebrates the first day of the rest of your life.

Your heart is as big as my hopes for you and yet, nothing is as big as the future that waits for you.
Own this
Make this yours
Never negotiate your dreams or compromise your potential for something less-then or unrewarding or underserving of your attention.
This is the best advice I can give you

And now, here is my dose of reality.
you are going to make mistakes.
you are going to choose poorly more than once.
you are going to fall.

You are going to get hurt.
You are going to experience heartache.
And yes, your heart will be broken a number of times.
Such is life.

You are going to win friends and lose friends and the same as you inhale and exhale, life is very similar, —people will come in and replenish your lungs, and you will exhale to remove the unwanted debris of unneeded and unwanted things.

Hold your breath every so often and take a deep one too to appreciate the wind a nice, fine day.

You are going to experience confusion.
You are going to face fears.
You are going to see things that make you challenge your belief in goodness, which is fine, if you ask me. This is fine because the fact that you understand the difference between good and evil shows that you have a higher value and a moral compass that is working and operational.

You are going to learn that today’s importance will be thrown away with tomorrow’s trash.

Your heart and your mind and your opinions will change.
You will go through a series of updating.
You will update your thinking.
You will update your understanding.
You will update your friends and as for your potential; this will update as well.
Always allow yourself to update and improve.

Never allow someone else to have so much power over you that you soften your stance or give in to an intimidation that limits your ability.
Never let this be so and if this becomes so, never let yourself give in to a contaminated mindset that suggests you could not survive otherwise.

Do not buy into the social pretense or the snobbery that puts people above or below you.
Be you.
No one in this world is more beautiful

Trust me
I know this is true.
But none of this means anything until you know this is true.

Go.
Be.
Do.
Live.
Love.
Laugh
Learn.

This is all I ask.
I love you and I am so proud

OF YOU!