You’re Dying, Get Over It, Start Living

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

“God made the world round so we would never be able to see too far down the road.”  Isak Dinesen (pseudonym for Danish author Karen Blixen)

Title: The Last Lecture

Competency: self-development

Who benefits: anyone who can read or watch TV

Consultant Usage: coaching, stories for trainers

What’s it about? My daughter gave me this book for Father’s Day.  Many of you know that it is a best seller about an award winning professor, Randy Pausch, at Carnegie Mellon University who learns that he is dying and has 3-6 months of good health left.  In what may be the ultimate coincidence, he receives an invitation from the University to deliver a presentation in their “Last Lecture” series (disclosure, the name of the series had recently changed but the intent remained the same). 

He delivered that lecture.  It was called “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams” and it wasn’t about dying.  It was all about living.

This posting is longer than usual because I have lots to say about this book.  I will even make it easy for you to stop reading after the next paragraph, but if you have the time, I encourage you to read on.

There are a number of reasons not to read this book.  It doesn’t fit the stereotype of a “last lecture”.  It is about an extended family you don’t know and will never meet.  There isn’t anything of real importance in the book that you haven’t already read or heard some other place in your life.  The book is riddled with clichés.

I love this book.  It spoke volumes to me both professionally and personally.  And it is a book small in size and only 203 pages.

Three chapter headings give you a pretty good idea where this book is going: “Adventures…and Lessons Learned”; “Enabling the Dreams of Others”; and “It’s About How to Live Your Life”.

Here are some professional tidbits I took away from the book:

On Leadership: Captain Kirk makes a great role model.  He wasn’t the brightest dude on the Enterprise.  But he surrounded himself with great talent, delegated and trusted them to do their jobs, was passionate about his work, set the vision, and spoke the truth even if it was a bit harsh.  (He also points out, much to my delight, that the Star Trek communicator devise that let him talk to the people back on the ship is today known as the cell phone!)

On Feedback: Everyone needs a “Dutch Uncle”, someone who will tell them the truth.  Without feedback you are going to be limited in what you can accomplish in life.  If you don’t have a Dutch Uncle or good mentor, 360 Degree Feedback is the modern technology to fill this void.

On Brick Walls: Brick walls are what you sometimes run into when trying to achieve your goals.  Brick walls are Mother Nature’s way of finding out just how determined you are to reach your goal(s).  You can let the brick wall stop you or you can chip away at the bricks until you have a hole big enough to let you through.  Your choice.

On Time Management: He has a list of things on how to manage time.  Nothing new on the list; but oh those stories he tells to support his list makes you smile or even laugh out loud (especially the one about the pregnant woman!).

On Coaching Others: Tell the truth, but say it so they can hear it.  (He writes this after admitting that he is a “recovering jerk”.)

On Whining: Complaining does not work as a strategy.

On Team Building: A simple list that any of us can do.

On Clichés: He deliberately uses them because they make great teaching points.  It is the stories behind the clichés that make them important (and he has some great stories). 

Here are two personal takeaways from this book.  They are far more than than tidbits.  I have saved the best for last:

On dying and fun: “I’m dying and I’m having fun.  And I’m going to keep having fun every day I have left.  Because there’s no other way to play it.”

On enabling others: He became a teacher (professor) so he could help others achieve their potential.  The moral of these chapters is that we are not whole until we give back to other people and the world we live in.  His words made me tingle for a very special reason.  In another month I embark on a journey to southern Mexico to live and teach in a community of poor children.  I think Randy Pausch would approve.

Randy stopped having fun on July 25th, 2008.  His last request was not to be sad or have pity for him – it was to get on with putting and keeping fun in your life.

 The 75-minute video version of The Last Lecture can be found at http://www.thelastlecture.com/. 

 
[tags]the last lecture, randy pausch, dutch uncle, captain kirk, enabling others, fun, bill bradley, william bradley,  bradley[/tags]

 

 

Bill Bradley

Bill Bradley (mostly) retired after 35 years in organizational consulting, training and management development. During those years he worked internally with seven organizations and trained and consulted externally with more than 90 large and small businesses, government agencies, hospitals and schools.