10. Remind Yourself: Be Present

 There’s no there. That elusive ‘there’ with the job, the beach house, the dream, it’s not out there. There is here. It’s in you… right now.

– Brian Kenny
Commencement Address at Ohio Northern University, 2007

Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course… We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead the stars come out every night, and we watch television

– Paul Hawken
Commencement Address at University of Portland, 2009

 It doesn’t matter that your dream came true if you spent your whole life sleeping. So get out there and go for it, but don’t be caught waiting. It’s great to plan for your future. Just don’t live there, because really nothing ever happens in the future. Whatever happens happens now, so live your life where the action is — now.

– Jerry Zucker
Commencement Address at University of Wisconsin 2003

 We’re not just gathered here on a lovely May day in an ordinary auditorium at SF state. We’re all strapped in, seated together on a gigantic ball whirling around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour, nested in a galaxy hurtling through the depths of space and time at 1.3 million miles per hour

– Kirk Schneider
Commencement Address at San Francisco State University 2010

 Don’t be absent from your own life.

Jessica Lange – Commencement Address at Sarah Lawrence College, 2008