To know this man can walk out there and calmly tell the entire audience he is dying, displays a tremendous amount of courage and selflessness. He shows the CT scans of his liver and talks about his cancerous tumors as if it were no big deal. Randy Pausch is to be admired and I am in total awe of him. He takes the phrase “the power of positive thinking” to a whole new level. I love it when he drops to the floor and does the push ups to show he is presently healthy! He begins with his childhood dreams, how we can achieve our dreams and enable the dreams of others. I feel this is a critical concept to adapt in order for a teacher to connect with their students.
He remembers to mention everyone, thank everyone, praise everyone who has helped him achieve his goals. Here is a link, to 20 of Randy's great motivational quotes Be Life Savvy. He personalizes this lecture with the childhood photos and the list of his dreams. I like the way he talks about his dream of football and tells how he “learned more from this dream not coming true than any of the others.” The coach pushed him to do his best and surprisingly, to this day he feels most comfortable on a football field. Sometimes we have to push through the situations we like least in life to learn and grow as a person. This is something as teachers we can pass on to our future students. The old picture of encyclopedias on the bookshelf really brought back childhood memories for me as well. We can all learn something from him, and his message. Life is what you make of it and if you think positively you can accomplish amazing things.
His dream of wanting to be Captain Kirk from Star Trek, and the picture slide was really cute. Then I thought it was awesome that he actually met William Shatner when he came to MIT to check out his lab. Wanting to be a Disney Imagineer and the vacation pictures were so sweet. When he talks about being turned down for a job at Disney, he points out that the brick walls are there for a reason; to show how badly we want something. That is a motivating message for anyone to hear. Randy uses humor and fun stories to motivate everyone, especially his students.
Randy shoots straight when trying to get his message across to the audience. The story of the virtual reality of Disney’s Aladdin project was very impressive. He actually briefed the Secretary of Defense! Wow! So the Imagineer dream actually comes true for him with the help of his friend, Jon Snoddy, who gave him so much helpful advice. When he moved from the University of Virginia to Carnegie Mellon every member of his team except one went with him. This is a testament as to what kind of professor and person he was. Once he was at Carnegie, he produced 5 different projects every two weeks. He accomplished so much with the project, “Building Virtual Worlds”. I love how he always manages to throw a joke in that cracks up the entire crowd. He shares his memories of this lecture room from which he is giving his last. It is obvious that he cares about his students deeply.
He also reveals his love of life and his love of technology and all that a person can do with it. Randy Pausch shows such dignity when he tells his class “when you’ve had something for 10 years that you hold so precious, it is the toughest thing in the world to hand it over, so my advice is to find someone who is better than you.” How many professors at a prestigious school would be that open and down to earth? Not many. His statement that "the best gift an educator can give is to be self reflective" is so true and is something all teachers need to hear. When talking about lessons learned, Randy shows through family pictures that he gets his great attitude towards life and drive to help others from his parents. When he says have fun when teaching and that "he doesn’t know how to NOT have fun, that he’s dying and having fun", it gave me chill bumps. What a man. What a spirit.
We all need to remember to have fun when we teach. The comparison, “Are you a Tigger or an Eeyore?” is fabulous. It really makes you think. We should all try to be Tiggers. The first “head fake” was great, Randy reveals that his message is actually not about how to make your dreams come true, but how to lead your life.
The second "head fake" was even better. He says this talk wasn’t for his class but for his kids. It melted my heart. How we lead our lives is vital to our success as an individual. Randy Pausch was constantly thinking about others throughout his career and life, as well as his last lecture. When he had the cake brought out for his wife because it was also her birthday, it showed the selfless love he has for others. He is right, we do need to be honest, help others and live our lives to the fullest. This video has showm me things about my own life, how I want to be viewed by others and how I want to lead my life. This man was absolutely amazing.
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