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by Natalie Linnell
EDITOR'S NOTE: Each year the Technolog publishes the IT student commencement address. Natalie Linnell, who earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics and computer science, gave this year's address.
It has been said, "Passion without precision is merely chaos." But without passion, without inspiration, there is no reason to aspire to precision. In IT, we expend a great deal of effort to master the methods of precision. But I think that the element of passion is far more essential to the technical fields than many people tend to realize, including at times those in these fields.
The human mind can find beauty anywhere, and it is often this perception of beauty that inspires scientific achievement. The aesthetic of an elegantly turned proof, when presented to the right eyes, can be more heart-wrenchingly beautiful than a Chopin nocturne.
Many people seem to think that the only reason anyone would ever choose to pursue a degree in a technical field is that they can make lots of money when they graduate. However, the call to build robots or design new drugs can be just as alluring as the call to write novels, and the desire to create and discover new facets of one's chosen profession can be just as persistent for the scientist as it is for the novelist.
In order for most people to be happy in their work, they need to feel that what they're doing is important. And if you can implement a computer program that will help a doctor diagnose illnesses, you are indeed contributing something worthwhile.
Hopefully we all feel this pull toward our fields. After all, something made us choose the majors with which we are graduating right now. The fact that we are graduating today says we've managed to hold on to those things which made our majors exciting when we first encountered them.
I'm sure we've all had times when we questioned our choices. But we kept in mind the things that inspire us about our fields of study. And this is something that we must continue to do once we go out into the workplace and gain employment. This is perhaps the key to enjoying one's work, to waking up in the morning excited about what you're going to be doing that day: to remember what drew you to it in the first place.
And whether you enjoy your work should not be a secondary consideration. It should, in fact, be the most important factor in choosing a job. I was talking to a fellow the other day who held a lucrative position at a large computer company—a very lucrative position that he had decided to leave in order to attend graduate school and become a professor, simply because teaching was what he'd always wanted to do. I found this to be rather remarkable, because I've noticed that often once people enter the workplace, after a while they seem to forget that they can change their situation—that if they don't like their job, they can find a new one.
Now this may seem incredibly naive to some of you, especially those of you who already have positions and families. I realize that there is no perfect job; no matter what you do, there will always be portions of your job you dislike. However, most of us will spend almost half our waking hours at work, so if you often leave those hours thinking that you accomplished nothing worthwhile, I can see no justification for failing to attempt to alter your situation.
Throughout life, there are times when we are faced with a choice, and it is easier to convince ourselves that there is no choice. That we are locked onto one path and there is no way off of it. It's hard to acknowledge that the choice is all yours, and thus the responsibility is all yours. The fear of making the wrong choice can be very strong.
But it is my feeling that, no matter where you end up in life, the situation is one of your own making; it is the one that you chose. Whether you make that choice through a conscious decision or by deciding that there is no choice, it was your decision that led you there. So have the courage to be an active participant in the direction your life takes. To take responsibility for your own happiness.
One place I see this courage manifested most clearly is in nontraditional students: people who already have jobs and families to support, coming back to school because they want to learn new things and advance in their current jobs, or because they want to find new, more exciting and more profitable work. I have a huge amount of admiration for these people who work eight hours in a day, make their children supper, and then go to class.
It has been my pleasure to become friends with a few of these students, and I have found it to be a wonderful experience. It has given me insight into certain facets of the person that I hope to be in a few years. And that is someone who is willing to put forth the hard work to switch careers if necessary so that she can do something she feels passionately about.
And it is important to apply this ideal of passion not only to one's professional life, but to one's personal life as well. As gratifying as the right career can be, most of us need our family and friends in our lives. Since we do spend so much time with our work, it can be difficult at times to keep in mind the fact that our accomplishments would mean little if we couldn't share them with the people close to us. It is important to love your work, but it shouldn't rule your life. Once it does, your life ceases to belong to you and begins to belong to your work. And if there's one thing that it's important to maintain ownership of, it's your life.
This is a time in our lives when, perhaps more than any other time, we are the masters of our own destiny. We can still see the world through eyes unclouded by the overwhelming minutiae of what needs to get done today and what won't get done today and what to make for dinner. We are poised at this moment between an ending and a beginning. And from this vantage point, we can still see clearly the entire future spread in front of us as a whole and decide consciously what we want from that future. Do not allow yourself to be held captive by your work. Allow it to inspire you.
