AN OPEN LETTER TO ALL GRADUATES - Stay Curious And Never Take Anything For Granted

Congratulations, graduates everywhere!

Congratulations on your advancement and achievement in formalized education, whether it is through a home school program, high school, trade school, college graduations or online classes.

Your formal education may end now, or go on to the next level for a higher degree or for personal enrichment. The educational process may or may not be complete, and your graduation day is over but your life experiences have just begun.

The learning continues.

Your generation is in a unique time in the history of our planet: the entire sum of the knowledge of mankind is at your fingertips, accessible to you at any time. You carry with you in your pocket the vastness of knowledge on any subject known to the human race.

Don’t take that for granted.

Be aware of how special that is, and that at one time it did not exist for some of us. Mine was the first generation to grow up with television. It was miraculous at the time, bringing images of the world and the creative imaginations of writers and entertainers right into our own living rooms. And it has influenced the thinking of the direction of many lives. I include myself in that observation.

Going to college was never really an option for me. There was no way I could decide or settle into one field of dedicated study. I had too many interests, (then and now), too many things to investigate. Although I settled on one particular area of endeavor, performing and writing music for the majority of my life, I explored many avenues of creation along the way – all without the aid of an internet, a world wide web of knowledge, or a computer or a phone in my hand. I was curious about the world around me.

Some of my curiosity manifested itself in me through television, our eye opening (but often put us to sleep) piece of technology. That large glass screen on the front of a big box now has been replaced - with newer and smaller devices that do all that and more. You have them in your hands. I see and appreciate that tech as an open door, a new means of traveling with your mind to new adventures of exploration, investigation and creation of unique things. Never think of that handheld device as just an object that needs to be replaced every two years and takes pictures of you and you friends looking ridiculous in a bar on Saturday night.

Think of it as a window to the universe and never take it for granted.

But remember, it’s only a tool. All of the pieces of tech I’ve mentioned are only tools. Stay curious. Ask questions of the world around you and look for the answers that satisfy that curiosity. Maintain an explorative nature and seek out new things. Use the devices in your hands and on your desks to enrich and educate yourself as you continue on your life's journey.

Use those things but never lose sight of the fact that all you do begins with the best tool you have at your disposal. It is the one that was under that funny looking cap on your head, the one you were born with. It is about three pounds of original and unique organic "technology" that got you where you are now. And there isn't another one exactly like it anywhere in the world.

Everything in your life begins and ends - with you!

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