January 1, 2008

For those who may not know who Randy Pausch is, he’s the university professor who was told he had only 6 months to live, as such, he decided to give one last lecture to his students. If you had only one last lecture to give, what would you speak about? This is great advice from somebody who has lived a very good life and some of these words may help you achieve your goals in the future.

Lecture’s Key Points

Aptly titled, his lecture is about achieving your dreams and allowing others to achieve theirs, here are the key points from his lecture:

• he grew up always being happy in his childhood, always dreaming about what could be, he was a child of the 60’s while people where landing on the moon when he was young
• dream specific dreams, they help to establish focus and make things happen
• get the fundamentals down otherwise the fancy stuff doesn’t work
• when people stop pointing out to you the things you are doing wrong, it means they have given up on you
• critics that carve you up are actually expressing their love for you
• experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted
• learning that is done indirectly is the most valuable type as they tend to stick with you through life and aren’t as easily forgotten
• you don’t have to be the smartest, most talented nor physically gifted person to succeed in life and lead others
• it’s cool to meet your boyhood idol but even better when they come to visit you because you have done something special
• brick walls are there not to keep you out but to provide a challenge to keep others out (how badly do you really want to achieve this goal?)
• it’s easy to sound smart when you study a subject intensely and ask others for advice
• wait long enough and people will surprise you
• it’s important to realize when you are in a pissing match and even more importantly to get out of it as quickly as possible
• there is a good way and a bad way to say “I don’t know”
• giving people a bar to strive for only does them a disservice, tell people they can always do better then they will, DO BETTER. People will always better themselves at a far faster pace then if you give them specific criteria to be met
• if you are going to be a pioneer in anything, you will get arrows in your back and experience many headaches but it will be all worth it when you look back
• find somebody better then you to give a project you hold dear
• self-reflection is the best give you can give anybody
• parents and mentors are vitally important to achieving a successful life
• being humble is a very difficult habit to build and maintain
• respect authority while questioning it
• never loose your childhood wonder, it’s what keeps your mind young and energy boundless
• it’s fun to do the impossible
• loyalty is a two way street
• actions speak louder then words
• never give up on achieving your goals
• you cannot get “there” alone, earnest people are worth more then any salesman could ever hope to be
• apologize when you screw up and focus on other people
• brick walls show us our dedication
• don’t bail out, the best gold is at the bottom of barrels of crap
• when you do the right thing, good things will come out of it
• get a feedback loop and LISTEN to it
• show gratitude
• don’t complain, just work harder
• be good at something that makes you valuable
• be prepared, luck is where preparation meets opportunity
• if you lead your life the right way, karma will make your dreams become reality

If you wish to watch this for yourself, here is the video of the entire lecture thanks to Google.

After the lecture

As some of you may know, this lecture became an international hit in 2007 after it was given. He appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show to discuss his situation and the lecture, spent a day with the Pittsburgh Steelers to accomplish his goal to play for the NFL and even better, Disney through it’s subsidiary, purchased the rights to his story for millions of dollars, providing his family with financial security long after he is gone. I think the only way to explain this is the last summary I wrote about his lecture, if you lead your life the right way, karma will make your dreams become reality.

The Bottom Line

Dreams are as important as breathing (hint hint).

PS: I wish everybody a very happy and prosperous 2008!

More information about:

• Randy Pausch himself at Carnegie Mellon
• Transcript of this lecture
• Alice Programming Project
• Entertainment Technology Center
• Randy Pausch on Wikipedia

In North America and to a lesser degree in Europe, when you call customer service, more often then not, your being patched directly through to an Indian call center to handle your requests. Taxes with companies such as H&R Block are also subcontracted to India including a lot of manufacturing, resource allocation and even strategic development. If you have some money and don’t have time to become pregnant yourself, it only makes sense to outsource that to India as well!

Pregnancy

It’s no secret that the entire process of pregnancy takes a number of the woman, that, till now, was simply a birthright, there where no other alternatives. The hormonal, psychological and physical toll or pregnancy stay with her the rest of her life along with the stretch marks. Pregnancy isn’t without it’s risks but as women push their child bearing years into their mid to late 30s, infertility becomes a growing issue as well. India serves an unlimited number of young, economically disadvantaged women who are willing, if the price is right, to become a surrogate. The process occurs through in-vitro fertilization (sorry guys) using the man’s sperm and the woman’s eggs, they are then implanted into the surrogate. The end result? Your child in every sense of the word, sharing no genetic material with the surrogate and your wife or girlfriend gets to keep her amazing body, having a child without ever taking a day off work nor pain associated with giving birth.

Womb for Rent

Now, this surrogate isn’t getting pregnant with your child for the fun of it, she expects to be financially compensated. In India, a woman can expect around $4 500 for the entire process, not a lot by First World standards but this is 15 years of wages for the average maid! She gets pregnant and wins essentially a lottery that sets her up on a better path in the future. She wins as she gets out of relative poverty, the family wins as they get a child out of the transaction. Both winners right?

Self-Induced problem

It’s no secret that one of the major factors causing infertility is age, the longer people wait before starting a family, the harder it will be. A woman as at her peak reproductively in her 20s, out in nature, this isn’t a problem but in the real world, that is right before university, after high school! It seems nature hasn’t adapted fast enough to our ever changing world and now, couples the world over, are paying dearly for it. A woman having a child in her 20s, unless within a very secure relationship, has a higher chance of being marginalized the rest of her life. I wrote a few months back about my experiences working in Canada and Australia at minimum wage jobs, what I may not have mentioned is that the vast majority of the women that where there, you guessed it, started their family in their early 20s if not younger. They where mostly divorced or never got married to begin with, most of them hated their jobs as much as their lot in life. For men, although we can have children all our lives, our peak is in our mid 20s. It isn’t just infertility rates that increase with age by the way, genetic defects rise as well such as Autism, Down Syndrome and a host of other conditions that a family would want to avoid at all costs.

Moral Issues

This isn’t just happening in India, it’s happening around the world, even in the industrialized world so I am not picking on India specifically. The biggest question you need to ask in these circumstances is that if the woman was economically advantaged, would she want to become a surrogate for a family she has no relationship with? Although there are exceptions, I bet 95% of the time the answer will be “Hell No”. So, the question must be asked, is renting a strangers womb for 9 months a moral act? I know that on the streets of Bangkok (Thailand), you can rent a young woman for $20US for a 24 hour period (use your imagination) so is this much different? How much different is renting a woman for 9 months compared to a 24 hour period, or even buying a liver for that matter? These are poor women, who have no real choice, selling the only thing they have to try to better themselves. Alternatively, most people rent their brains and bodies 8 hours a day, so how is even this act different? I am not here to preach, but just think about this and feel free to share your comments.

The Bottom Line

There is no way around this, renting a person, now matter how well intentioned, is still renting a person.

Buzvia: Giving birth becomes the latest job outsourced to India