Graduation, Gratitude, and Getting Back to the Why of It

There are milestones that mark our lives. Moments when you realise nothing will ever be the same again. Being graduated is such a moment. From now on your lifespan is divided into two, before my graduation and after my graduation. The volume and diversity of choices, options, and opportunities multiply when you get graduated. The problems that you had when you began your graduation studies, and had during it, seem small now, and you are masters at solving them. You look back and smile at them with a pleasant feeling for you haven’t collapsed under its weight, or even if you had collapsed once or a couple of times, you have got up and walked again. You have made it through, you have done it, and you can do it again with the experience and resourcefulness that you have gathered. Congratulations to you.

Be Grateful

Look at the stage, and to your right and to your left, you will find your teachers. Like in a film, some of them were, of course, your heroes, some of them were your villains, sidekicks, henchmen, mentors, some were heralds of a time to come. Now when you see all the dots connected, you understand pretty well, why some of them were your villains and looked like henchmen etc. Farewell is a time to thank. Gratitude studies say that people who thank are less aggressive, they even have less suicidal tendencies. They even outperform others in contributing to the family, society and the nation.

We Are Grateful Too

A moment like this, I must tell you, as an institution we are immensely grateful to you. You have chosen IIPR for your higher studies, and you have come out in flying colours, you have made IIPR proud in various ways. Thank you for being part of IIPR for these years.

The good that you have done in on this campus; may be in the classrooms or meeting rooms, in your peer groups, will have a lasting impact. I also agree that there may have times the institution would have been harsh on you, almost made life difficult. Whatever may be the reason, or whoever is the cause, I must tell you something, if you have been authentic and truthful in your engagement it would be already having an impact in your life, and on the campus.

I have seen it happening in my 15 odd years of academic career that when a student asks a very disturbing question in a class, an average teacher gets upset, and asks the student to get out for she/he disturbs her/his and the so called normal class's peace. But remember, you may have gone out, but the question has remained in the class, in the meeting room, in the peer group; and the question will seek answers. I have seen people being left behind, put out of families and communities, being excommunicated from religious and political establishments because they dared to question; they may have paid a price; but the question will remain; and answers will emerge.

Get Back to the Why

Do not forget why you decided to study further after your +2 or after your graduation. You may have had reasons as small as earning an income and making a living to changing the world; keep that why alive. You have not come this far just to come this far.

Abraham Lincoln, the 16^th president of United States, supposed to have said, if you ask me to chop down a tree in six hours of time, I will spend first four ours sharpening my axe. Education is sharpening of the axe; you must work with what you have learned.

However rich you are, affluent you are, you may have enough to live on for generations to come. You must work. You haven’t sharpened your axe to put it under a bushel. A lazy individual or society reaches nowhere. Work is one of the most transformational forces that we have. Work is the key to empowerment; work hard, work smart. Do not keep eating bread from another’s sweat.

As time goes soon enough you will find your axe blunt again, not impactful, non-influential, not successful etc. do not continue doing the same thing without impact and successful; re-sharpen your axe, get back to learning. These are very volatile times, times are changing too fast, continue to learn.

Keep learning new things, keep working, keep smiling, and keep going. Wish you all the very best, and May God bless you.

Speech delivered at IIPR during graduation and farewell, 2025

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