With good reason. Few commencement speakers have ever delivered as ballsy a speech as the Infinite Jest writer did: He acknowledges that life is dominated by boring, rote tasks that we just have to get through—jobs, going to the grocery store, traffic—but that the true meaning of a successful life is not forgetting the big picture amid the rat race. Having empathy, he says, and learning how “to really think and pay attention” to yourself and those around you will make even the worst “crowded, hot, slow, consumer-hell type situation not only meaningful, but sacred.”
The below video added some powerful visuals to a nine-minute snippet from the larger address. This year's graduates, and non-graduates alike, will take something from it.
[H/T: Gawker]
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