A message to 2014 high school graduating classes

As you complete your high school sojourn you should explore as many decent choices and opportunities as possible and try to understand what each means and where they will eventually take you. These choices and decisions you make will follow and shape you for the rest of your lives. During that deep and introspective process, it is imperative that you should be very deliberative and reach out to trusted folks who can assist you in that endeavour.

Not bad choices such as assisting or condoning in the continuous destruction of the environment or succumbing to a superficial lifestyle and sub-culture such as social media. But one where hard work, discipline, sacrifice and succeeding eventually in the old fashion way- by earning it. Be careful of the friendships you cultivate and exercise caution and be doubling vigilant when establishing long term romantic relationships. The world is full of trickery, malice, broken dreams and wasted lives.
These choices will most definitely hinder or help your chances of achieving your full potentials.

Rather surround yourselves with positive and optimistic people and embrace choices that are appealing and admirable but may not be easy. I am sure some of you will reach heights that will transcend your backgrounds and you will succeed beyond your wildest childhood dreams. At this stage of your life and despite the chaos that surrounds us, Dominica and the world is still an exciting playground. You have the fortitude to explore and capture it. However, in order to capture this playground which is laced with mine fields, you will need to have a serious, no nonsense and business like priority list and attitude and a willingness to delay gratification. You will need guidance and some pointers to keep you on the correct trajectory, on task and on schedule.

Some simple pointers which serve as guides to me are a few pictures that line the walls of my home and work offices. These pictures are not only worth 1000 words but they bestow knowledge, strength, the present and the future. Among the pictures of my family is one of the Jubilee Cross in La Plaine with a panoramic view of the rolling hills of Morne Gouveneur and another is of a banana field in Castle Bruce on a rainy day. There is also a large picture of my kids before the small monument in Cas Gowrie (La Plaine) commemorating the peasants who died in 1893 while fighting for their dignity and that of future generations during the La Plaine tax riot. Of the two other pictures on the wall, one shows the Dominica Grammar School (DGS) unit of the Dominica Cadet Corps and the other is my editorial staff of the DGS magazine, ‘The Clarion‘, during my last year of high school.

The images not only serve as guides but also display and convey many important symbols and messages. They represent the fact that our institutions, parents and forbearers who came along before us paved the way and made it easier for us and future generations. The pictures whisper to me in a very fundamental way that the past is prologue and history is one of the greatest teachers of mankind and that the greatest of all failures is to forget one’s past or where one came from. The more I gaze at the pictures the more I understand what truth and life are all about.

So who are those who have helped you become who you are today and what you are destined to become? My hunch is that anyone who has ever graduated from high school or college or has made any strides in life has at least one person to be thankful for. We don’t just become competent and successful adults without the investment of others along the way. Give an invisible gift to those people who have cared for you and always believed in you.

Give a gift of a silent minute to think about the people who have been a very important part of your lives. Some maybe your parents, teachers, clergy, mentors and role models. Some of them may have already gone to meet their maker- your grandparents. Whenever and wherever they are, if they have loved and cared, encouraged and wanted only the best of what life has to offer for you now is the time to remember them. Just imagine how pleased they must be at that moment of your lives.

One of the most important things human beings can do is to express thanks. The Greek word for thanks is Eucharist. It is one of many expressions of how Catholics describe the love and devotion we feel for God. The Eucharist is the source, center, and summit of everything in our lives. This gesture and recognition to people who have helped you succeed is one of the most important aspects of your high school graduation.

Please learn to be humble in your victories and honorable in your defeats and disappointments. It is not the honors, prizes, fancy and superficial things of life that are the most important that ultimately nourish our souls. It is the knowing that we can be trusted and that we are the bedrock of ‘good stuff’ and we never fear or fail the truth and honesty in spite of criticisms. That’s what makes humanity the most potential glorious enterprise on earth.

While you are young take time to map your journey’s course. Dream big, hope, pray and say thank you. Be compassionate, respectful and considerate to others who are less fortunate. These attributes will ultimately have the biggest impact on your lives. You have every reason to be optimistic about the future. According Professor John Scheer of the university of California at Santa Cruz : ‘The future is a place that is created- created first in mind and will; created next in activity; the paths are not to be found but made, and the activity of making them changes both the maker and the destination’. Good luck and God’s speed.