Before I start, I want to share “Building Nests in Windy Places”— the Scripps 2011 Senior Commencement Speech delivered by Joss Greene. I watched the speech yesterday and was inspired to write this blog post. Joss so beautifully articules everything I have personally been grappling with this past year– how to define success on my own terms, how to achieve a school/life balance that is happy and healthy, and how to envision and start creating a future of fulfillment and value.

Joss opens the speech by challenging the audience with this question: “Who gets to say what is a worthwhile use of your time?” One change I can readily identify in myself since arriving at Scripps is the way I perceive and prioritize my time. I realized after sophomore year that I constantly felt overwhelmed and exhausted from self-imposed stress– activities and classes that I chose of my volition. It occurred to me that I was challenging and pushing myself for the sole reason of testing my limits and capabilities. Instead of being enriching and interesting, these added activities/ projects/ classes drained my time and prevented me from investing energy in other things I enjoy and value– things as simple as my hanging out with my friends, going to the gym, laying in Jaqua, attending discussions and events on campus, etc. Studying abroad fall of my junior year solidified this need for balance. While in India, I found myself perceivably happier on a daily basis because I was able to enjoy and engage fully with the people and places around me. As a result of this mental peace, I learnt better, produced higher quality work, and felt more academically satisfied and accomplished. Returning to Scripps, I began a conscious and active effort to disassociate my self-evaluations of success with external measures of worth– grades, rankings, purely “resume” activities, and so on. This is an incredibly difficult task, especially for someone who has spent the past 20 years deriving their self-worth from these very same standards. However, had I persisted in defining success as the survival of difficulties, I would have risked neglecting and disregarding my interest in public health and social justice. My change in career values came from these shifting understandings of success and happiness.

As Joss addresses in his speech, a critical step in achieving happiness is listening to and respecting our bodies. For me, a huge part of finding balance has been learning to respond to my body’s signals and needs. For instance, this past week was a whirlwind of work and deadlines, and by Friday I was sick with a cold and felt physically tense from residual stress. So on Saturday, instead of forcing myself to write the section of my thesis due next week, I hopped on the Metrolink into L.A. with some friends and romped around the city for a few hours. I returned from a wonderful afternoon outdoors re-energized and mentally prepared to be productive. I will finish my thesis chapter and accomplish the same amount of work whether or not I went to L.A., but now I can approach my tasks with a reinvigorated and healthier state of mind and attitude. I admit, I still religiously consult my color-coded schedule, but the change has been in not letting the to-do lists compromise my day-to-day happiness.

Whatever I do in the future, whether it be working or going back to school or starting a family, I hope to continue striving to re-define success and worth by my own values and intuitions. I hope to find fulfillment in aspects of my life outside of my position, pay, or title. The following quote has been on a sticky-note on my computer for over a year now. The message isn’t revolutionary, just a reminder to pause and consider if I am living up to this ideal. Scripps, where and how do you find balance? What are your standards for success? 

“To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends. To appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know that even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.” –Anonymous