http://concertina419u.cabbycentral.com/ Inspire Minds to Change Lives id http://concertina419u.cabbycentral.com/2009/01/31/you-become-what-you-believe-inspiring-speech-by-oprah-winfrey.html Oprah Winfrey’s Commencement Address Wellesley College. May 30, 1997 My hat’s off to you! My hat’s off to you! [crowd cheers: Go Girl!] You all have “gone” girls! I desire to say thank you, Dr. Walsh as well as to the esteemed faculty, to those of you parents–what you have been through, God Bless you–and to the greatest class that has ever graduated from Wellesley. I must say–you are my heart, Dr. Walsh is right. I saw you walking in as well as I started to weep, as well as I don’t consider myself a weeper, but I guess I must be if I started to weep, because of the fact that I know what it takes to get through here as well as I am so proud of all of you on behalf of getting through. You all know this, that life is a journey as well as I desire to share with you just on behalf of a few moments about five things (aren’t you glad they aren’t ten) five things that have made this journey on behalf of me exciting. Five lessons that I’ve learned that if I had gone to Wellesley I could have not made as numerous mistakes, but five lessons that I’ve learned that have helped me to manufacture my life better. First of all, life is a journey. I’ve learned to become more fully who you are as well as that is what I love about this institution, it allows women to come to the fullest extent of their possibilities who they really are as well as that’s what life does–teach you to be who you are. It took me a while to get that lesson, that it really is just about everyday experiences, teaching you, moment in, moment out, who you really are. That every experience is here to teach you more fully how to be who you really are. Because, on behalf of a long time I wanted to be somebody else. I mean growing up I didn’t have a lot of role models. I was born in l954. On TV there was only Buckwheat, as well as I was ten years old before I saw Diana Ross on “The Ed Sullivan Show” with the Supremes as well as said I desire to be like that. It took me a long time to realize I was never going to have Diana Ross’ thighs, no matter how numerous diets I went on, as well as I was not going to have her hair neither except when I bought some. I came to the realization at the end of being in television as well as having the news director trying to manufacture me into something that I wasn’t as well as going to New York as well as allowing myself to be treated less than I should have been–going to a beauty salon, you all know there's a difference between Black hair as well as White hair. That is the one thing you learn the first week at Wellesley: how did you get your hair to do that? What I learned going to a beauty salon as well as asking them, at the end of the news director told me that my hair was too thick as well as my eyes were too far apart as well as I needed a makeover, sitting in a French beauty salon, allowing them to put a French perm on my Black hair as well as having the perm burn through my cerebral cortex as well as not being the woman that I am now, so not having the courage to say, “this is burning me,” as well as coming out a week later bald as well as having to go on the air. You learn a lot about yourself when you are Black, as well as a woman as well as bald as well as trying to be an anchor woman. You learn you are not Diana Ross as well as that you are not Barbara Walters who I was trying to be at the time. I had a lot of lessons. I remember going on the air numerous times as well as not reading my copy in advance of time. I was on the air one night as well as ran across the word “Barbados,” that may be Barbados to you but it was ” Barb-a-does” to me that night as well as telling the story as an anchor woman about a vote in absentia in California, I thought it was located near San Francisco. This is when I broke out of my Barbara shell, because of the fact that I am sitting there, crossing my legs, trying to talk like Barbara, be like Barbara, as well as I was reading a story about someone with a “blaze” attitude which, if I had gone to Wellesley, I would have known it was blasé as well as I started to laugh at myself on the air as well as broke through my Barbara shell as well as had decided on that day that laughing was OK even though Barbara hadn’t at that time. It was through my series of mistakes that I learned I could be a better Oprah than I could be a better Barbara. I permitted Barbara to be the mentor on behalf of me, as she at all times has been, as well as I decided then to endeavour to pursue the idea of being myself as well as I am just thrilled that I get paid so much every day on behalf of just being myself, but it was a lesson long in coming, recognizing that I had the instinct, that inner voice that told me that you require to endeavour to find a way to answer to your posses truth was the voice I needed to be still as well as listen to. One of the other great lessons I learned taught to me by my friend as well as mentor, Maya Angelou as well as if you can get this, you can save yourself a lot of time. Wendy as well as I have had numerous discussions about this, particularly when it comes to men, in spite of the fact that she has a very lovely one right now. Remember this because of the fact that this shall happen numerous times in your life: When people show you who they are, trust them, the first time. Not the 29th time! That is particularly good when it comes to men situations because of the fact that when he doesn’t call back the first time, when you are mistreated the first time, when you see someone who shows you a lack of integrity or dishonesty the first time, know that that shall be followed by many, many, numerous other times that shall at some point in life come back to haunt or hurt you. When people show you who they are, trust them, the first time. Live your life from truth as well as you shall survive everything, everything, I trust even death. You shall survive everything if you can reside your life from the point of view of truth. That took me a while to get, pretending to be something I wasn’t, wanting to be somebody I couldn’t, but understanding deep inside myself when I was willing to listen, that my posses truth as well as only my posses truth could set me free. Turn your wounds into wisdom. You shall be wounded numerous times in your life. You’ll manufacture mistakes. Some people shall call them failures but I have learned that failure is really God’s way of saying, “Excuse me, you’re moving in the wrong direction.” It’s just an experience, just an experience. I remember being taken off the air in Baltimore, being told that I was no longer being fit on behalf of television as well as that I could not anchor the news because of the fact that I used to go out on the stories as well as my posses truth was, even though I am not a weeper, I would cry on behalf of the people in the stories, which really wasn’t very effective as a news reporter to be covering a fire as well as crying because of the fact that the people lost their house [pretending to cry as she said this]. And it wasn’t until I was demoted as an on-air anchor woman as well as thrown into the talk show arena to eliminate me, that I permitted my posses truth to come through. The first day I was on the air doing my first talk show back in l978, it felt like breathing, which is what your true passion should feel like. It should be so natural to you. And so, I took what had been a mistake, what had been perceived as a failure with my career as an anchor woman in the news business as well as turned it into a talk show career that’s done OK on behalf of me! Be grateful. I have kept a journal since I was l5 years old as well as if you look back on my journal when I was l5, l6, it’s all filled with boy trouble, men trouble, my daddy wouldn’t let me go to Shoney’s with Anthony Otie, things like that. As I’ve grown older, I have learned to appreciate living in the moment as well as I request that you do, too. I am asking this graduating class, those of you here, I’ve requested all of my viewers in America as well as across the world to do this one thing. Keep a grateful journal. Every night list five things that happened this day, in days to come that you are grateful for. What it shall begin to do is to modification your perspective of your day as well as your life. I trust that if you can learn to focus on what you have, you shall at all times see that the universe is abundant as well as you shall have more. If you focus as well as focus in your life on what you don’t have, you shall never have enough. Be grateful. Keep a journal. You all are all over my journal tonight. Create the highest, grandest vision possible on behalf of your life because of the fact that you become what you believe. When I was little girl, Mississippi, growing up on the farm, only Buckwheat as a role model, watching my grandmother boil clothes in a big, iron pot through the screen door, because of the fact that we didn’t have a washing machine as well as made everything we had. I watched her as well as realized somehow inside myself, in the spirit of myself, that in spite of the fact that this was segregated Mississippi as well as I was “colored” as well as female, that my life could be bigger, greater than what I saw. I remember being four or five years old, I certainly couldn’t articulate it, but it was a feeling as well as a feeling that I permitted myself to follow. I permitted myself to follow it because of the fact that if you were to request me what is the secret to my success, it is because of the fact that I understand that there's a power greater than myself, that rules my life as well as in life if you can be still long sufficient in all of your endeavors, the good times, the hard times, to connect yourself to the source, I call it God, you can call it whatever you desire to, the force, nature, Allah, the power. If you can connect yourself to the source as well as permit the energy that is your personality, your life force to be connected to the greater force, anything is possible on behalf of you. I am proof of that. I think that my life, the fact that I was born where I was born, as well as the time that I was as well as have been able to do what I have done speaks to the possibility. Not that I am special, but that it could be done. Hold the highest, grandest vision on behalf of yourself. Just recently we followed Tina Turner around the country because of the fact that I wanted to be Tina. So I had me a lovely little wig made as well as I followed Tina Turner because of the fact that that is what I can do as well as one of the reasons I wanted to do that is Tina Turner is one of those women who have overcome great obstacles, was battered in her life, as well as like a phoenix rose out of that to have great legs as well as a great sense of herself. I wanted to honor other women who had overcome obstacles as well as to say that Tina’s life, in spite of the fact that she is this great stage performer, Tina’s life is a mirror of your life because of the fact that it proves that you can overcome. Every life speaks to the power of what can be done. So I wanted to honor women all over the country as well as celebrate their dreams as well as Tina’s tour was referred to as the Wildest Dreams Tour. I requested women to write me their wildest dreams as well as tell me what their wildest dreams were. Our intention was to fulfill their wildest dreams. We got 77,000 letters, 77,000. To our disappointment we found that the deeper the wound the smaller the dreams. So numerous women had such small visions, such small dreams on behalf of their lives that we had a diffcult time coming up with dreams to fulfill. So we did fulfill some. We paid off all of the college debt, hmmm, on behalf of a young woman whose mother had died as well as she put her sisters as well as brothers through school. We paid off all of the bills on behalf of a woman who had been battered as well as managed to put herself through college as well as her daughter through college. We sent a woman to Egypt who was dying of cancer as well as her lifetime dream was to sit on a camel as well as utilize a cell phone. We bought a house on behalf of another woman whose dream had at all times been to have her posses residence but because of the fact that she was battered as well as had to flee with her children one night, had to leave the residence seventeen years ago. And then we took the other women who said we just wanted to see you, Oprah, as well as meet Tina. That was their dream! Imagine when we paid off the debt, gave the house, gave the trip to Egypt, the attitudes we got from the women who said, “I just desire to see you.” And some of them afterwards were crying to me saying that “we didn’t know, we didn’t know, as well as this is unfair,” as well as I said, that is the lesson: you needed to dream a bigger dream on behalf of yourself. That is the lesson. Hold the highest vision possible on behalf of your life as well as it can come true.        Sat, 31 Jan 2009 05:50:35 -0500 concertina419u