摘录：Liz Murray 在 DePauw University的演讲

最近看了一部电影《Homeless to Harvard》，看了几篇影评，又看了一段演讲，演讲摘录如下。

很同意演讲中的一句话:what a man can be he must be.

I don’t know how long can you know that there is somethingbigger for you and yet you ignore that.

Don’t we do that?  We tell ourselves what? I’m gonna takeon a bigger picture in myself, I really will recess my career, relationship,health.

When?  Later! Right?

We always do this. I am. I just can’t because I’m busyright now and we get so wrapped up in the moment we make this promise toourselves later. I pushed away school to later. I pushed away taking, steppinginto my life in the biggest sense. I push that away later. And when you pushthat away, you’ll push away even the most important things.

Now cause I used to visit my mother in the hospital for 5hours, I got to sit with her all day, I used to, you know, I was the person whovisit her most, so I felt responsible for bringing her the strawberry milkshakefrom the cafeteria, or you know the oldish, like the oldie, so we used tolisten to the radio, and we singing songs together, and I helped her wash herhair while we played the radio, and clumps of my mother’s hair would come outin my hands.

Anybodyever lose somebody to disease? You know what Imean by this? There’re good days and bad days, and then the bad days becomemore frequent，And when thatbecame too painful, and I believe it did. I said "ma you know what I love you, Igotta go, I’m gonna hang out with my friends and I’ll be back later.“And I treated her like later, like I’ll get to that later, too, I pushed heraway so much, now I’ll never forget the last time I saw her was on thanksgivingday, she wouldn’t eat, you know the hospital gave you “the celebratory meal”,she wouldn’t eat it because she had sour in her mouth. And when that’s too muchI said, ”ma youknow I love you, I’ll be back later.“ I did not come back. Shepassed away about a month later, and we buried her the day after Christmas. Wedidn’t have money for a real funeral so they donate a plain box with thatseries number on it. And they have the words “Head and feet” and they drew anarrow on her pine box.

I don’t know, have you ever had experience that had impacted you sodeeply that it changed the person that you are?

You looked to tell people about it but sometimes words don’tdo it. When I lost her and I connected to this experience of thinking, you knowcause I was sure I had it later, and yeah here was the pine box and there wasno later. I saw this opportunity and I just realized and you know what, there’ssomething in this for me to realize and learn from, it didn’t come to me atfirst, at first I just wanted to cry and you believe me I did, and I miss herto the stage, like I’m talking to you guys about you now and I’m remembering Ihad a dream about her last night. Like I keep it here. But she gave me a gift.And that gift is the reason that I’m here with you today. Because I swore I hadit later. And I push that out so much.

Have you ever heard a saying, “what a man can be he must be”? 

See before she passed away,I thought I had all the time in the world.But then Iwent back to my neighborhood and I hang out with my friends and I thought lifecould be the same.

But when she wasn’t there anymore, this amazing thinghappen to me and transformed the person I am.I no longer had tolerancefor the stagnation in my life. And I hang outwith my friends who I love but they were sitting there and their wholeconversation had ten or eleven street-kid friends, we all likepunk Rockiesthat hanging up together, and do you know what they were doing when I got backfrom buried my mother?

They were in a conversation of complaining. I came back andafter I burying my mom and I hearing my friend Bobbie who’s complained abouthis mom, my other friend complained about school, this person complained about…

Youknow they were complaining and I sat down and I realized that the conversationI had created in my life, as much as I knew I had to survive, the conversationin my life was one of complaining. It’s likedo you have a friend that you call and every time you call they’re alwayshaving a bad day. You call them “How are youtoday?” and “ho… hanging in there.” Or you know maybe you are thefriend and you sound like that. You want to check in with yourself.

Cause I sat on my friend’s coaches and I realized they werecomplaining, complaining and complaining. And I sat down and I said to myself,

“you know what, and Ijust stood up and look at my friends and say guess what my friend, I don’t knowwhere I’m sleeping tonight, one of your house maybe, maybe outside, I don’tknow what I’m gonna eat, I don’t have, I don’t have I don’t have.”

“But you know what Ihave, 2 hands and 2 feet, I have a brain in my head and air in my lungs andwhat else do I really need?”

Like what else do youreally need to begin a today to lead the life you know you are meat to lead?You know when your heart what it is. And what more do you need to change beforeyou step into that? I stood up and I looked at them and then next feeling whichhas been the biggest resource in my life since  - “gratitude”.

You can either pick one thing in life, resentment orgratitude, get on the side, I promise you.  I looked at that moment and realized Imay not have my mother ever again, but I had these resources, I had myself andI could go forward. I knocked on every door of every school that wouldinterview me.  I was seeing majors of college freshman trying to enterhigh school. I was dressing gothic cloth, I smiled, I mean would you have takenme if I knocked on your door? I mean my transcript were atrain rack, I knockedon so many doors and I was told no so many times but I learned a valuable lesson at that time, as long asyou keep knocking, somebody will eventually say “Yes”.

I got accepted to a school. I enrolled and I committed tostraight As. I remember that the feeling inside of me and a needing to changemy life and that voice at the back of my head, it took on the specific questionand the question was“What … if?”

You know that voice in the back of your head and said whatif?

What if I tried that much harder? What if I push one moretime? What if, It’s the part of you that dreams. My what if was whatif I committed togo to school, got the best grades, could I change my life? Is thatpossible?  And I became so obsessed with that question, I enrolled inmorning class, regular class, after school class, night school independentstudy, Saturday class, I became a nerd. And I had really never been to school.And I did absolutely anything it took enrolled in one full year per semester.And I was sleeping on the street. 

I would come in everysingle day and I used all the energy in my body to produce and get things donebecause that vision that I had for myself, this bigger life that I was stepinto that became my commitment instead of my excuses.

I stepped into that and I worked very hard. I quicklygained a 96 average. I became the top student in the school and I hide from theteachers that I was homeless. Nobody knew thatmost nights when everybody went home. I would just go ahead and lay myself downon the, I go to the hallway around the corner from my school do my work by thehallway light. I come back in the morning and that would be it. Wash my face inthe sink. I mean there’re many things I did to survive, there maybetime after for questions, people always wanted to know, “did you eat from thegarbage?” did you… I mean they ask all these homeless questions. I’m totallyfine with answering them. But I want to share with you what transforms a life and itwouldn’t be “where I got my food”.

Let me leave the main points to these. This is really wherethe breakthrough was. And if ever there’s something in your life that you wantthat hasn’t turned out, you kind of can’t identify why I promise you can hearit in this. This is what holds us back. Sometimes I was sleep at friends’homes. And there’ll be 15 people sleeping across a floor in aflophouse.I had an hour subway ride to get to my school in Manhattan, I would steppedaround my friend when the sun is coming up and I remember getting to the door,early in the morningat my friend road passed out, and I would put myhand on the doorknob, ready for the day, early class, regular class, afterschool class, all that ahead of me. And I would be attempted, at that moment,touching that doorknob to go back to sleep.

And I would be hate with that feeling. And do you knowthat feeling when the alarm clock goes off and you go “you gotta be kiddingwith me?” No, not today, right. Or maybe you are in a buffet line and it’svegetable or bacon or you are at a moment and you just saying to yourself:there’s empowering choice or there’s disempowering choice, you got to pick one.

Here’s what holds us back from having what we want to have.I stood at that doorknob and face with the choice of empowerment ordisempowerment. That’s the moment I wanted to feel sorry for myself. Isn’t itinteresting how all the other times of the day when I was doing just fine and Ididn’t want to think about the sad stuff?

But just at the moment I had to come through with my commitment.See when you are faced with the choice and it’s gets a little tough you wantyourself off the hook by reminding yourself how hard your life is. And I had agood one. OK, I would stand there and think, oh, life’s tough. You know.Or look what happens to me when I was five. You know I would really summon all thetragedy and try to give myself an excuse to be in the disempowered conversationand give up.And I knew I really could make this choice but I so wantedto give up and I could have woke up one of my friends and say, hey guys life’ssuck, I shouldn’t do anything. And they would go ”Yeah”, they agree with me.You want to be careful where youget your agreement in life. I have lots of agreement around that.And it’s true, don’t you have that friend that said sure you are off thehook, we totally understand. I had that in my life, but here’s a difference. Adisempowered conversation will do a couple of things that will look for blameand it’s concerned with the past. It’ll go “What happened before? Why didn’t itwork out?” It’ll count what’s not there. That’s what a disempoweredconversation will do and it searches for blame.An empowered conversation is unconcerned with blame. It simply says,“what’s next?” and it’s steps forward with a willingness to be responsible forwhat happens next.That’s the differences between empowered anddisempowered conversation. And I stood at that doorway and I knew nothing in myhistory took away from the fact that I still had a choice.

What transforms a life?One empowered choice after the next over time.I stood there and I knew that nothing would take away from the factthat I am at every moment a choice. And I stepped to that empowered choice andtime went on and I crunched four years of school into two. I maintained myaverage with an A average. No one knew I was homeless at school. And finally atthe end, at the end, the teacher that I was so close with this name was perry,he took the top ten students on a trip to Boston. And we went sightseeing. Likefrom New York, and we went to Harvard Yard simply for a group picture in frontof the statue for the yearbook. And as I stood in the Harvard yard, I don’tknow, I don’t have the words,I mean it felt like it’s a beautiful moment in life when you thoughtsomething was above and beyond you. And you realized that really there’s nodifference between you and someone else. All you need to do is the work.And I stood there and I realized I was qualified. I dropped that application; Ifound out that college was $40000 a year I could not afford a turkey sandwich.So this was going to be a pinch.

And I looked for scholarships, and I happened upon this onescholarship from the New York Times. Somebody told me this was called the “godway”. Maybe you give me another name for it later, the criteria, $12000 a year,every year for school from the New York times. Please attach anautobiographical essay, outlining any obstacles you overcome in life. Well, Ineed to say, I put them in the mail, I actually thought they wouldn’t give itto me, I’d like to meet the person, cause you know, sorry, I just. Went through3 thousands of applicants there’s only 21 finalists and one day I walked intowelfare to apply for food stamps.

The next day, the next hour in the very same day I walkedinto a Harvard interview and in my town Manhattan and then later on I went toNew York times interview, so I went welfare, Harvard and New York Times, Iremember thinking, and welfare was the only thing that did not go well thatday. So someone tell what’s wrong about the system but I went in and the womenwas been difficult with me, I said I have an interview with Harvard this afterthis, she said “all right, princess”. We got Stanford and Yale coming in. Allright I laughed and I went to the Harvard interview, it went well.

I went to the New York times did not realized howprestigious the New York Times was. And listen in my neighborhoods no one readand I did not know. And I walked in, everyone was hyperventilating and freakingout, the knew. I came in and they offered me, hey are you hungry? There’s atray of pastry for me. No one would touch it cause they are hyperventilating.And I looked and yeah, I’m hungry. And I said could I take two doughnuts theysaid the whole tray is up for grab. I shoved the whole tray right into my bag.Walk myself to the New York Times Interview. They had a box of tissue for me tocry I didn’t realize and I said, oh good I thought, I start to wrapping up mydoughnuts at the interview begin with.

But you know the lesson in that? Sometimes when you don’t know what itis that you are not supposed to be able to do, you’ll go right ahead and do it.And I did. Six of us won the scholarship.

Thousands of applicants and six of us won the scholarshipand on the cover of Metro section, next to an article that has Bill HillaryClinton, then they have the six of us writing this article, it said “LizMurray, will graduate, having squeezed all four years into two with an Aaverage while homeless” So my secret was out. I talked about my mother passing,my father been died and all these other things that gone on.

And at the end I guess the reporter can’t help withhimself, he said, Liz was at the welfare in the morning and she came to sayyes, and he quoted the women, you got Yale or whatever it was. I hope you readthis. I thought I held in my hands.Everything has changed.

Life is beautiful. I’m sorry I just fulfilled with thefeeling of gratitude I’m standing here with you today. Life is a miracle.You don’t have to bestuck in a situation that you are in, if there’s something in your life that isholding you back, you have to identify what that is because I promise you thereis a way to break pasted. I, on June 4ththis year I’ll graduate from Harvard University with a degree in psychology. Iam so very blessed and so very grateful.

And the lessons that I take with me as I coach and leadworkshops. My dream now is to open pathways for other people. I like to be withpeople, listen closely for what’s in the way. Identify it, knock it out. Sothat we can step into what matter most to us.

I want each of us as we finish now, to get really clear onwhat it is. There’s some vision you have for your life. Where are you in yourvision in your career? Where are you and your relationship? There’s somethingyou have going on and you’re hard. And you know, you know that your heart is soclose to step into it.

I want you to identify that voice inside of yourself and begin totrust it. And ask what’s it that been in my way and how do I unblock that? Digdeep inside because you know of all things my mother have taught me, and mylater this and later that. Life does not wait for anyone. Life does not waitfor anyone and your life isn’t later. Your life is right now.