The Last Lecture

by Randy Pausch

What wisdom would we impart to the world if we knew it was our last chance? If we had to vanish tomorrow, what would we want as our legacy?

But being considered the best speaker in a computer science department is like being known as the tallest of the Seven Dwarfs.

There’s a lot of talk these days about giving children self-esteem. It’s not something you can give; it’s something they have to build. Coach Graham worked in a no-coddling zone. Self-esteem? He knew there was really only one way to teach kids how to develop it: You give them something they can’t do, they work hard until they find they can do it, and you just keep repeating the process.

The brick walls are there for a reason. They’re not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something.

I listened to her, and thought, as only a bachelor uncle can: “That’s just the sort of admonition that sets kids up for failure. Of course they’d eventually get my car dirty. Kids can’t help it.” So I made things easy. While my sister was outlining the rules, I slowly and deliberately opened a can of soda, turned it over, and poured it on the cloth seats in the back of the convertible. My message: People are more important than things. A car, even a pristine gem like my new convertible, was just a thing.

What a Kodak moment!

My kids don’t know what this means! Haha!

automobiles are there to get you from point A to point B. They are utilitarian devices, not expressions of social status.

I’ve heard so many people talk of a downward spiral in our educational system, and I think one key factor is that there is too much stroking and too little real feedback.

Luck is indeed where preparation meets opportunity.

My dad gave me the tongue-lashing of a lifetime. He believed manual labor was beneath no one. He said he’d prefer that I worked hard and became the best ditch-digger in the world rather than coasting along as a self-impressed elitist behind a desk.

Mistakes are part of the process of parenting, and she shouldn’t attribute them all to the fact that she’ll be raising the kids herself.

Some single parents fall into the trap of trying to compensate by giving the kids material things. Jai knows: No material possessions can make up for a missing parent, and they can actually do harm in establishing a kid’s values.

Though I’m not a fan of TV—it’s mankind’s greatest time-waster—the