Seth Frazer 6th Period Speech Class 5/10/12

Graduation Speech

Hello there, fondest greetings to you all, parents, teachers, friends, & total strangers. Today is a day I have longed to see for many years. But, even now, Im in total shock that it has arrived &, strangely, I wish it wasnt hear. If I could I would burn it all away & I really wonder why? Is this not what I wanted? Maybe I just never really knew what I wanted in this area. The end is what I have yearned for so desperately, in my illness of the contagious senioritis to take within my grasp. So, why does it disgust me so much that I ever wanted that? WellIll tell you. I believe it was the metal band Slipknot who said in their song Til We DieLike family is much more than blood. So, therefore, I wish to give you all a modest proposal. My brothers & sisters of the graduating class of 2012, I want you all to ponder on one wordfarewell. What sort of meaning does this word have to you? For some, it is a word that means goodbye, so long, adieu. It is a hopeless word that only sends a message that there is an ending that we all are destined to embrace. So classes graduate, drift apart, & individually fall into forever. For me, personally, that word means almost the complete opposite. You could say it is a word that simply means, to be

continued or tune in later for exciting conclusion. It holds a hope of coming to a new chapter while, at the same time, looking back & never letting go of any of the previous chapters. You all will indeed drift awayinto this river that I call my heart. The earth is round &, unlike all the other shapes, can rotate & bring one right back to the exact, same place you once stood before& just as it rotates I pray that our paths will be crossed in a similar place, whether it would be hear or anywhere else, further down the line, from within the sands of time. I can almost promise youyears from now, I can see myself gazing into the sky on a breezy, spring afternoon & see each & everyone of your faces within the shapes the clouds take the form of. Why? Because you all will always be on my mind & held in a special place within me. Over the years of growing up & walking the halls of Fairland East, West, Middle, & HighI realize now how much of a journey it is that I have taken in discovering a great deal about myself with all of you by my side. That is something almost no one in my future could ever live up to. A great legacy that should never be forgotten. Truenot all of it has been a simplistic joy-ride. Ive faced extreme darkness, anxiety, brokenness, grief, & even states of being emotionally obsolete. So much of me has died & yet, so much has also found life as well along the way. It was by some of you, that my Lord, God, & savior used to help carry me through it all. Now, for those of you who never were involved in that way for medont think you have played any less of a role in the journey. Because, I cant deny, there has always been something to be learned from within the personalities of each of you. Inspiration does come from many sources. If

you think lowly of what kind of person youve grown up to bethen permit me to be the one to say to you that, in this life, in every lowthere will always be a high. Before we leave this gym (this being the final gathering of us all in full unity as a class) & go out into the world to pursue our dreams & things we have intimacy & passion for, I want to share with you a major high Ive found in the lows Ive been met with in my past while growing up with you all. First off, I want to encourage you all to chase what you love & what you are good at & not to be ashamed of what it may beas long as it is morally sound. If you feel you cant make it to that point, that the words of others dishearten you, that you feel as if you just dont measure up to what God wants out of you, or even if youve made mistakes in your past that hold you down to points of pure bitterness todayall I can say isyou have only God to tell you what your worth & what you are to be in this life (the words of the creation mean little when compared to the words of the creator.) For those who tell you what you desire just cant happen. Let me quote the late Charlie Sheen who said, Cant is the cancer of happen. As for mistakes, do not regret anything youve done or will do. All regret does is make you fell less about yourself & gets you absolutely nowhere in life. I want to share with you 2 verses from The Holy Bible that hold deep meaning to me in the subject of regret. 2 Corinthians 7:10 says, For Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. Also, Romans 8:1 says that, There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

We are all imperfect human beings. Why should we expect anything but imperfection from ourselves? Im not saying we should use that logic as an excuse to fail in lifebut to motivate us to rise above what we can naturally achieve with just our own strengthwhich, speaking on behalf of my personal experiences, is very little when compared to what one can pull off under the spiritual shelter of Jesus Christ. Im going to make a littlemovie reference if you will. Im sure youve all heard of a film titled Batman Begins, which is a great movie by the way. Well, in the movie, the main character Bruce Wayne loses his parent at an early age to the desperate & greedy gunshots of some random mugger in an alley. He spends his whole childhood, teenage years, & early adulthood blaming himself for their deaths because he was the one who had them walk into the alley. Well, eventually, he comes across a very wise teacher who tells him that his parents death was not his fault, but their own, considering that they failed to act. Yes, the mugger had a gun. But, Bruce knew that that would have never stopped him from acting. But, he thought that just because he had had training for extreme self-defense, that made him better or less likely to fall than his parents ever were. But then, his teacher tells him one of the most insightful things Ive ever heard anyone say. He said, The training is nothing, the will is everything. For us, in this casescenario, the training, or all the classes & courses weve taken over the years were nothing. Nothing but a bunch of boring sessions lasting 30-50 minutes each, 7 times a day, 5 days a week, for an almost 10-month period of time. However, what weve taken

from those classes, what weve heard, interpreted, & applied to our lifestyles from those classesis everything. Everything school was meant to hold for us all. Now, back to my point I was making earlier, before I went into all that depth on this subject, how much will do you have to make the most of your life after high school? There isnt a single hint of doubt in my mind that potential is far from the word lacking within this class. Its definitely there. You just have to, under the free will you all have as citizens of the United States of America & as children of God, make that potential what it is fully capable of being. You only live twice. So I say to you all, in the words of Avenged Sevenfold, Seize the day! If I may be so bold to saycongratulations to us all, the graduating class of 2012. Weve fought the wars of yesterday with building a strong backboneto hold up the prosperity thats in store for us tomorrow! Now, the time has come for me to sayfarewell & God bless you all.