Life Essentials: Taking Risks, Overcoming Fear

Life Essentials: Taking Risks, Overcoming Fear... and Having Fun

Commencement Address by Andrew Chappell, Assistant Headmaster for Program

Overcoming Fear...

Members of the Board of Trustees, my fellow faculty and staff colleagues, parents, families, and especially the great Class of 2021, I am honored and humbled to stand before you this morning as the commencement speaker.

To the Class of 2021: I know I speak for all of your parents when I say how proud we are of each and every one of you. From the first days I met each of you as Admission Director to this moment on O’Keeffe Field, you have impressed me and so many others with what you have accomplished and, even more importantly, with who you are as people. And, Brady, it is hard to believe that this moment has come. Your grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, mom, sister, and I love you very much. I only hope you remember to call your mom at least once a week and text your sister every day. That goes for the rest of you boys, too!

To my fellow faculty and staff colleagues: Thank you for all that you do and have done for Brady and all of these boys. I am thankful for the opportunity to work side-by-side with each of you, and I know that my fellow parents join me in thanking you for all that you have done for these boys.

A few years back, when the world seemed normal and predictable, the Chappell family was fortunate (very fortunate, in fact, thanks to some generous support from the school) to travel to South Africa. We divided our time between Kruger National Park and Cape Town. It was a once in a lifetime travel experience. On the first leg of our journey, we spent a few days driving around Kruger National Park in a mini-van searching for and finding wild animals—elephants, a black rhino, a lion, and countless other wildlife native to the area. After a few days of this, we decided to do something different; we went white water rafting nearby on

the Sabie River. As part of the experience, we were led by three, friendly, local guides who were there to show us the way, keep us safe, and provide some humor and adventure. As we paddled down the river, riding the rapids and enjoying the sights, the guides would from time to time paddle ahead of our group and slap the water with their paddles. The reason for this, they told us, was to see whether there were any hippos lingering under the water. “You don’t want to be paddling above a hippo when it comes up out of the water,” offered one guide. The dramatic reality of this adventure began to settle in: we could be attacked by a hippo, and it might not end well. We paddled on and thankfully never saw a hippo that day—anticlimactic, I know. But as I reflect back on that voyage down the Sabie River, I realize that there are several lessons that translate to this moment, which are at the core of my message to you this morning.

Take Risks In the winter and spring of my junior year of college, I studied abroad—something that I hope all of you will do. As luck would have it, a childhood friend of mine also chose to study abroad at that same time, in the same city. When the semester came to an end, we decided to spend a few months traveling before heading back to the U.S. When we would talk about where we would go and what we would see, the two of us—who had grown up in a small, rural county in central Virginia, nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains—marveled at the idea of walking through the Colosseum, or studying paintings in the Louvre. At one point my friend looked at me and said, “How about Egypt and Israel?” Up to this point, these two destinations—exotic, to my mind—had not been part of the conversation, so I was caught off guard. To be clear, in the late-90s, Egypt and Israel were not regarded as safe places to visit, but my friend was determined, and he kept pushing. Finally, I relented. We had an amazing time, crawling inside the Giza pyramids, hiking up Mt. Sinai in the middle of the night, floating in the Dead Sea, biking around the Sea of Galilee—all of this even as we read local newspaper articles about bus bombings, even as we could hear SCUD missiles hitting their targets in the distance. These and many other experiences in Egypt and Israel are seared into my memory for life. If not for my friend and his persistence, I would not have experienced any of it. So my first piece of advice is this: Take risks—the younger, the better, I would argue. Even when they seem a little dangerous, even when mom or dad isn’t sure about it. (I mean, be smart. Use your brain. But try things. Go for it.)

Conquer Your Fears I have found that most people don’t like to talk about their fears. There is ample research to suggest that lots of boys and men feel that admitting one’s fears is a sign of weakness, not strength. In my experience, I’ve learned that the opposite is true. To be clear, a big part of the success of that trip around Egypt and Israel, and of that whitewater rafting trip down the Sabie River, was my ability to identify my fears, and then move past them. By doing that, I was able to experience and enjoy the adventure. My charge to each of you, in whatever sphere of influence you have moving forward, is to change the narrative that acknowledging and expressing fear is a weakness. In the past year alone, fear has consumed all of us: fear of getting COVID, fear of losing a loved one. In order to get beyond fear, in order to make changes, we have to be able to name it. That’s the only way to address it.

A phobia I have—which I share with most of you according to research, in fact—is doing what I am doing right now: speaking in public. Some surveys report that people fear public speaking even more than death. Those who have seen me speak before may remember a moment when I fell apart in front of a crowd. One that I remember well, too well, was one of the first opportunities I had to deliver an Admission Coffee talk to a group of parents in my first year as Admission Director here at RL. I stood up and began talking. Everything was fine at first, and then at one point I looked up and made eye contact with a dad in the crowd. All of a sudden, I could feel a bead of perspiration drip down my face, and then I began to pour like a rain storm in a tropical forest. That same dad stood up near the end and offered me some tissues to dry myself off. I was the literal definition of a “hot mess.” But, I worked at it, sought out advice and strategies from people I trusted, and I stand before you today, well, sweating, but sweating for a different reason—it’s hot out here! So my advice is this: Conquering your fears will be essential to experiencing a full life. As many of you know, the Latin root of the word courage—cor—means heart. Courage originally translated to “speaking openly about what is on one’s heart.”1 Though the popular definition has changed over time, I think

“As you begin your next chapter, do not forget that you will always have this band of brothers, your families, your teachers and coaches from this chapter of your life who are always one text, email, or call away. These relationships will last a lifetime and will help provide the strength you need to pursue and experience the life you will lead.”

returning to that original definition of courage—of being open, honest—is important. So figure out what you are afraid of, and start to do the work of admitting those fears in order to conquer them.

Don’t Take Life for Granted Three years and four months ago, I received a phone call that would change my life. My mom and dad were on the other end of the phone, and they were telling me that my dad had been diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. I was speechless. After the shock of the news set in, my mind quickly went to solving the problem: Who is his doctor? What are the treatment options? We all agreed that my dad could beat it. There was chemo, radiation, a new and promising immunotherapy treatment that he qualified for. I booked my flight for the next week to join my dad for his first treatments. The fight against his cancer began. Well, the fight for my dad didn’t end the way we had hoped. The cancer was aggressive, and my dad passed away four short months later. It wasn’t because he and his doctors didn’t try. They did everything they could, but the reality was that the situation was beyond our control, and we lost my dad. One of the most important takeaways I had from this devastating experience was that in so many cases, we simply can’t control the results. We can’t control the outcomes. We often think we can—hope we can—but the reality is that in life so much is beyond our control. All we can do is put in the work, try our very best with what we have in front of us, and then let the chips fall where they may.

Of course you all know how tenuous life can be, how it can turn on a dime. Just look at the last fifteen months. Last March our lives were turned upside down, virtually overnight. Just within your little bubble, in-person classes, sports seasons, most extracurricular activities, and May Day were cancelled; the outlook for what your senior year would look like was bleak; and opportunities to visit colleges, impossible. And suddenly simpler, less materialistic needs came into view: the need for human connection. People simply missed each other. They (you!) wanted to be with one another to watch games, listen to music, and laugh together—simple things that all of us had taken for granted before the pandemic. You’ve all heard the saying, “You don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone,” but the truth, I believe, is that we actually do know what we have; we just never think we will lose it. In the case of my dad, or our experiences over this past year, we are reminded that we shouldn’t take life for granted. We shouldn’t expect that the people we love, or the things we love to do, will be here tomorrow.

Have Fun When I was a freshman in college, I would often go to “the stacks”—the space in the library very similar to RL’s, where tables are situated between stacks or shelves full of books. I went there to study, because I found it difficult to concentrate

1Brene Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection

in my dorm room. Throughout the semester, there were always other students in the stacks, but it was never full.

At the end of my first semester, however, I went to the stacks to study for final exams. Every chair at every table was taken, filled with stressed out students who were studying intently. There was an anxious exhaustion that permeated every inch of the space. I sat down and got to work, pouring over my notes, making study guides, and preparing for what would be my first set of college exams. All of a sudden, amidst the still hum of all that intense studying, came a loud “Yee-haw!” I looked over to see two guys—one on his hands and knees and the other sitting on his back—charging into the stacks screaming at the top of their lungs, “Yee-haw!” As they trotted through the stacks mimicking a cowboy riding a horse, smiles and laughs and relief swept over the space. These two cowboys made their way out the opposite end, and just as quickly the focus swept right back over the students seated at the tables— we simply got back to work, appreciative, however, of the playfulness, the happy distraction, and the reminder to keep our studying in perspective.

As you already know, playfulness and fun are key ingredients to enjoying life. There will be plenty of moments—there already have been, perhaps—when your responsibilities, work, relationships, challenges will feel like weights that you cannot lift. Those are the moments when you need someone to remind you to smile, to laugh; those are the moments when you need a Yee-haw or to surround yourself with Yee-haw people, to help you keep everything in perspective, to keep things light and fun.

The Voyage Now, back to the Sabie River in South Africa: Battling the rapids and keeping my eye out for a hippo, I remind you that I wasn’t alone. I was on that journey with my family. We were taking on the challenge together. The same has been and will continue to be true for you. Here at Roxbury Latin, individually and collectively you have achieved much and also struggled—winning and losing games, debates, VEX robotic competitions, singing in concerts and acting in plays—but most importantly you did this all together. As you begin your next chapter, do not forget that you will always have this band of brothers, your families, your teachers and coaches from this chapter of your life who are always one text, email, or call away. These relationships will last a lifetime and will help provide the strength you need to pursue and experience the life you will lead.

Of course, your journey is far from over; it’s just beginning, and there is so much you are rightly looking forward to, and that your teachers, parents, families, and friends are eager to watch unfold. Where will you go? Whom will you meet? What will you do? These are questions that you likely are impatient to find the answers to, but exploring and discovering the answers to those questions is what makes life so rewarding. Like those guides did for me on that paddle trip on the Sabie River, I hope I have been able to slap the water for you a little bit this morning—to remind you to take risks, to conquer your fears, not to take life for granted, and to have fun along the way.

Finally, I’d like to leave you with these words, the lyrics of a song written by Johnny Duhan and made famous by Christy Moore, that I hope tie together many of the messages I have shared this morning. My dad—who was a singer and musician—sang this song often at family gatherings, and it was one of the final songs I ever heard him sing:

The Voyage

I am a sailor, you’re my first mate We signed on together, we coupled our fate Hauled up our anchor, determined not to fail For the hearts treasure, together we set sail With no maps to guide us we steered our own course Rode out the storms when the winds were gale force Sat out the doldrums in patience and hope Working together we learned how to cope

Life is an ocean and love is a boat In troubled water that keeps us afloat When we started the voyage, there was just me and you Now gathered round us, we have our own crew Together we’re in this relationship We built it with care to last the whole trip Our true destination’s not marked on any charts We’re navigating to the shores of the heart

Boys, good luck and thank you. //