By Jason Lim
This is graduation season in America. And I am sure that all you new graduates have been inundated by questions from family and friends asking: “How do you feel?”
Then they would probably proceed to tell you exactly how you should feel by saying: “You must feel excited; you must feel great; you must be filled with such hope for the future.” Well, I am sure you wish you could tell them that you have a job lined up and could afford to move out of your parents’ house. The recession isn’t helping, is it?
But despite all the doom and gloom, you should feel excited and hopeful for the future. At the same time, you should also be scared to death at the uncertainties facing you and humbled by the choices that you know you will have to make.
And that’s exactly why you should be scared, because you have so many choices that, once made, will continue to affect you long after they have been made with consequences that could go far beyond your individual lives. Consequences for your families, your organizations, your nation, and your world.
By graduating from college, you cannot deny that you have been blessed with more opportunities than most to become leaders in your chosen fields in many nations of world. This means that you are blessed with more opportunities than most to make choices that will affect how we and your children will live as Americans, Jews, Arabs, Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, French, Hungarians, Germans, Indians, Kenyans, Liberians, and South Africans, among others.
One of you may well be called upon to make a choice that will make or break a peace accord between North and South Koreans. One of you may have to make a choice between rescuing child soldiers in Africa and condemning them to their continued horrible existence. Some of you will make choices that will safeguard lives as they travel for business or pleasure. It doesn’t have to be as dramatic as these, but many of you will certainly be called upon to make choices that will have real impact upon real people and their families.
In short, by graduating from college today, you will all be blessed with opportunities to make choices that matter in people’s lives.
This is why I say you should be scared by the choices that you will have to make. But I also say you are blessed by the opportunities to make these choices because, as scary as the consequences of a bad choice can be, the promise of a good choice is far greater, for it represents the chance to support those who are persecuted for the sake of freedom, the possibility of sharing the bounty of this earth with those who are hungry, and the satisfaction that comes from knowing that you made a difference for the better. All these can be achieved by the choices that you will make.
No matter what your short-term future looks like, you should take away two key lessons from college. One, the realization that your choices have the power to affect others in a very real way. Two, the realization that you can make choices based upon your hopes for our world, rather than just based upon your fears about your own personal and immediate survival, like so many of our fellow citizens on earth.
You should also be profoundly thankful to your parents because their choices blessed you with the opportunity to make choices that ― in whatever form or scale ― will matter in your lives and in our world. And don’t forget those who chose to fight and die for the cause of freedom.
This is especially true as we approach the 61st anniversary of the Korean War. In a very real sense, without their courageous choices so many years ago, you and I might not have any opportunity to make choices today. In a word, they chose so that we would have the freedom to choose.
I believe that this is the essence of a good choice. Making choices ― in full awareness ― not just for ourselves but for our children and our future together. This is the foundation of good leadership.
So, take a moment to be grateful to the professors, administrators, and others in your college community who have educated, encouraged, and inspired you to realize the true meaning of a good choice. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you will always make the right choices, but know you will now choose with deeper wisdom, more prudence, and much gratitude because of their efforts. In a sense, their choice on your behalf will forever be a part of your choices for our future.
Jason Lim is a Washington, D.C.-based consultant in organizational leadership, culture, and change management. He has been writing for The Korea Times since 2006. He can be reached at jasonlim@msn.com and on Facebook.com/jasonlim2000.