Be Who You Ought to Be: Commencement Address from Liam Spychala ’25

Embrace failure. I think I should repeat that though because what many of you just heard was, “Avoid failure.” Embrace failure. It really, really sucks to fail. Frankly, failure is not a theme of the Prep school, and honestly, I’m not sure any school would want failure to be one of their themes, but it means we don’t have experience with it. When you inevitably face it, though, you must learn to accept it. Often this is described as getting back up when you get knocked down, but to me this definition feels like you leave it behind, you almost hide it, in a way. The true challenge is carrying it with you, but I don’t mean this in a negative way. Don’t let it weigh you down and prevent you from moving, but I would tell you to let it ground you. Let the heaviest mistakes give a certain heft to your life, an extra umph to the punch you pack. It keeps you modest and true to who you want to be. It also makes success all the greater because instead of having just the joy of reaching that goal, you also have the pride in remembering what you have been able to overcome. – In trying to leave it behind, you lead a dishonest life.

You will inevitably be faced with moments where you feel like you don’t stack up, that you are somehow less than others. This can be especially hard when you don’t have control over the metric that you are worse by. This could be a job opportunity that passes you by, a college acceptance maybe, or even just what other people think of you. It is not our role to get stuck on these roadblocks. In these situations, it is easy to blame yourself because it really does feel like you were the reason why you didn’t get it. You turn inward and you say, how could I have let this happen, when in reality, it is that something has been done to you. – A question that will likely come up if you face this struggle is, “Where did I go wrong?” But what we have to remember is that there aren’t right or wrong choices in this matter because of how subjective it is. – They didn’t say, “NO” to every part of you, they only said no to the part that you let them see. They don’t know what you don’t tell them, they can only assume. We all make impossible decisions at some point in our lives, and someone will always get hurt. To act so selfishly and to act as though you alone suffer is wholly wrong. I believe in your ability to move past this way of thinking, to realize and accept these nuances of reality.

You are so much more than your greatest accomplishments. Now, don’t go thinking, “Wow, I’m even better than I thought I was.” No. I’m saying that your most prideful moments are likely not as impactful as you think they are, at least not to the surrounding community. Nobody receives awards for being a great parent, nor do you get praise for being a good friend.

Ground yourself in the unseriousness of life. So little has ever ridden on the score of a test or the result of a course. It just doesn’t make sense to weigh so heavily the short term and momentary goals when we humans have this ability to look into the future and say, “Yes, this is the type of person I want to someday be,” and then you set out to do it. This mindset of forward thinking and flexibility prepares us well because there aren’t any test corrections for life.

How you carry yourself and your actions are pretty final. You can’t bring someone back to life, you can’t really take back what you say, and time keeps passing, always. The wonderful thing is, despite not allowing for test corrections, there are no wrong answers. You get to create the questions, and you even get to choose which ones you answer. Should I take this opportunity? How can I serve those around me? What brings me purpose – fulfillment? The only way that you can fail this test is to lie to yourself. In lying to yourself you’ve been cheated of having your own life. You sacrifice “the self” for “the other.” Never a good plan.

Be people of the greatest character. There is no way to even begin this process, which is the hardest part. There is no checklist for how to be a person of great character, and even when you begin to describe it, those things lose their value because drawing attention to actions that improve one’s character makes them take away from your character. This idea of not being able to know when you’ve reached great character is just like being a lifelong learner. Being inspired, thoughtful, and curious, applies to your character too. So, how would I recommend that you become someone of character, it’s not possible – I just told you that. What I would tell you though is to act with genuine care and respect for others, and you will LOVE the way that you see yourself. It isn’t something you do, becoming these things, it’s something you are. Chase after this with a thunderous zeal. Let people make no mistake in who you are and why you believe that you should be who you are.

Once you live as a person of character, you will find yourself doing things you never would have expected. You will be recognized far more for doing the things that nobody wants to do than the things people expect of you. But don’t take up those things because you know that you’ll be valued for that, but first find that you care for others and the actions will follow. You do these things earnestly too, because you truly believe in them rather than doing them because it’s the “right thing to do” and somebody’s watching.

Strive for greatness, settle for good. It makes sense to be driven and to have a desire to excel, and in fact it is good to desire to excel. But make sure to settle for good as well. I think it’s also funny the illusion that we put around what we perceive to be the best. There are so many ways to be successful in life, but our monkey brain still goes, “this person tells me I’m less good, and it looks like they’re doing better than I am, so I must be less than them.” – Life is just such a game sometimes, a really fun one at that, so don’t be the person that loses because you think that the rulebook is always right.

The last piece of advice that I’ll leave you with is to practice gratitude. This is a perfect time to reflect on thankfulness and love. If you really think about it, you have done nothing to get yourself to where you are today. You have taken advantage of what has been given to you, sure, but you and I likely did nothing to earn that for ourselves. This, paired with the fact that you are ready to leave a part of you in the past, is probably the most impactful time to thank those that have allowed you to come to this school and become the bright young adults that you are. And I’m sure there are things beyond that too that you can thank people for, it doesn’t have to just be teachers or parents, mentors, and even friends can be very important to you and I think it’s worth at least talking to them about their importance to you. Remember, they don’t know what you don’t tell them.
– And teachers, parents, and mentors, when your child or student thank you, they were probably already going to do that and this only makes them look bad. Don’t go, “oh yeah sure pal you and I both know you’re doing this because of that kid in the front of the abbey who wouldn’t shut up about gratitude.”

In attempting to speak on most everything I’ve spoken of perhaps almost nothing. Just as this speech could only have hoped to inspire and bear fruit beyond these nine minutes, that is what I call us to do. To take these values and these messages and go out into the world. See in others’ eyes that glint of possibility that I see in each and every one of yours. We all have the ability to change ourselves and the world for the better, so let’s go and do it.

Liam Spychala ’25