“Today’s the day my life begins. All my life I’ve been just me. Just a smart mouth kid. Today I become a citizen of the world. Today I become a grown up. Today I become accountable to someone other than myself and my parents. Accountable for more than just my grades. Today, I become accountable to the world. To the future. To all the possibilities that life has to offer. Starting today, my job is to show up, wide eyed and willing and ready. For what, I don’t know. No matter what happens, I’ll be ready. For anything. For everything. To take on life. To take on love. To take on the responsibility and possibility. Today, my friends, our lives begin. And I, for one, can’t wait.”

I don’t normally write publicly about my life. I usually share abstract, non specific words pertaining to the bigger picture, but I think it’s time to change that. In less than two months, I reach the age of 23, what we refer to as the Michael Jordan year. It will be the year I graduate from college, and begin to make decisions.

And so it begins…

I’m in the B School, armed with caffeine, disgusting snacks out of a machine, my trusty (new) computer and a semester’s worth of reading ahead. School is OFFICIALLY back in. I gave up on my whole “no caffeine” thing today as I was falling asleep in class. It lasted for over a year for the most part, so I guess you can say mission accomplished. It’s still one of my worst enemies, but it’s definitely going to be one of my best friends again.

I guess I started studying down here sophomore year with Taylor and Megan. Living in Hinton James and being a regular Arts and Sciences student, I had never had the pleasure of being inside the B School. It’s pretty much my favorite studying spot, along with the UL. I prefer the UL during the day and the Business School at night. My third favorite study part is seriously late night Union studying with Alpine. Amazingness.

I suppose I feel sort of old now that most of the people I hung out with and studied with during college have since long graduated, but there’s a consistency to knowing that nothing has really changed here. Same old business school (with minor improvements on the first floor), same old classes, same old studying… and me feeling as if I’m seriously behind. Have no fear, I’ll probably be up all night long, no thanks to my surfing facebook and typing this up. At least I don’t have AIM or google chat to distract me anymore. AIM disappeared my junior year of college, about three years ago, and most of the people I google chat with have what I’ll call real lives and real jobs now. So they’re probably enjoying a drink, dinner, a movie, maybe two or all three, and having a blast with their college diploma. I, on the other hand, decided to join the “real world” two years ago when I wanted to take time off, and now I must drudge my way through my last year of undergrad.

I promise I’m happy about it, despite what I just wrote above. I love Carolina. I always will. Yet, it’s not even about where I am – maybe partly because it’s familiar and I have many memories tied to almost everywhere on campus. It’s about feeling as if I’m enriching my mind once again. During my time off, I’m not sure I did anything that required me to think analytically. I’m probably dusting the cob webs off my brain as we speak.

Different people, same place, same order of things. Most of my friends who have graduated remind me every so often how much they’d like to be back here. I’d love to tell them that not having to study is more fun than what I’m doing here on a Thursday night, but truthfully, it’s pretty amazing to be back for one last hurrah.

I can’t sleep. That’s what falling asleep at 9 PM will do to you. I’m not sure how I can be this tired after waking up at 11 AM, and only working for 6 hours, but I’m sure my body is grateful for the rest.

As a person, I think I’ve grown a bit lately. We’re always growing as people (I’d like to believe), but the past couple of months I’ve been trying to fulfill the goals I made for myself back in January. I think many of the goals I made are ones, should I choose to progress in fulfilling them, that will help build the life I’ve always wanted. In the same respect, I think the past few months have reminded me that these goals I’m making for myself, while valid, are just one more way I’m being ridiculously hard on myself. Healthy, or not healthy… that is a question I’m just not going to answer, nor really worry about.

Part of the growing I’ve done has been a direct response to people, whether directly or indirectly involved in my life, reminding me of the damage they can do to others’ lives. The last thing I’d rather do at this moment is bring attention to any of the bullshit going on around me, but for the sake of others, and not my own, I use this bullshit as a reminder for everyone to really watch whom they associate themselves with. I usually like to bring people into my life, because I love getting to know people and listening to their lives. I have been blessed to have met a great deal of amazing people, many of whom remain involved in my life to this day. I’ve had some of the best friends I could ask for, and I find that I mention them often because they have had a significant influence on who I have become. They above all deserve that credit.

Yet, in the midst of these wonderful people, I’ve had my share of people who, for lack of a better analogy, have taken butcher knives and stabbed me in the back. We all have. I place my trust in someone because I believe there’s a reason they are in my life, and then I find that they are just as immature as I originally thought them to be. I let a few people into my life this year that have inflicted significant emotional damage on a friend of mine… by using me. I wish I could have seen this coming in some way. I never imagined the manipulation that would take place, and the lies that would be spread without any warrant. In the scheme of things, the things that have been said are not important. I’ve personally ignored them, despite lies being made up about my life and people talking about me that don’t have one solitary clue as to who I am. However, the damage they have inflicted on another human being, without any reason or cause, is one of the most heinous crimes I can imagine committed.

I think of how naive I have been to let these people into my life, but at the same time, I realize I can’t keep people out. It’s not healthy to do so and I would miss out on letting the great people in. Even those who do bad things serve a purpose.

My apologies if this post is somewhat cryptic. In the end, all we’re going to have is how we lived our lives. This includes how we treat others. Actions speak much louder than words. Please keep in mind during your day, every day, to treat others in the manner to which you want to be treated. On another note, more specifically to the line of work I find myself in now, stay out of everyone’s business and remember the line between friend and boss/colleague, even if your superiors do not.

Each night before I go to sleep for the past few months, one song seems to play in my mind over and over. It is a song I learned as a child in Primary at church. Primary is our gathering of children ages 4 to 11 after Sunday School. There were talks and mostly times for us to learn new songs. My favorite song has always been “A Child’s Prayer”. I can’t describe to you how beautiful it is.

In my mind, the first verse would always repeat…

“Heavenly Father, are You really there? And do You hear and answer every child’s prayer?”

It has been quite the past couple of years for me, and faith has taken a back seat in my life. It has never disappeared, though. I am grateful that my faith is at least strong enough to stick around. I think that the time before we go to sleep, we have quiet moments to be with the reality that often fills our lives. As I sang that line so often in my mind, I think I really wanted someone to answer and help me through the trials I face each day.

Strangely enough, the answer is found in the song. I just couldn’t move my mind to sing the other lines.

“Pray, he is there. Speak, he is listening. You are His child; His love now surrounds you.”

I picked up “It’s Not Easy Being Green”, a book full of quotes from Jim Henson and his characters. It so often references the child like tendencies that we all have – the innocence in all of us. Jim reminds me that inside, I’m just a child. I’m still a kid with big dreams. I still get excited over Legos. I still love to play outside. I still tell corny jokes, and they still make me laugh. I keep the lessons I learned as a child so close to my heart, and it burns whenever I think of the simple truth I’ve always known. Heavenly Father is there, and He does hear me. I knew it as small child; I know it now.

From the time I was in high school, the one thing I looked forward to when I turned 18 was voting. Much to my disappointment, I missed voting in 2004 by only 8 days. I have such intense memories of the climate on campus that year, even in my own dorm room where both Bush and Kerry signs hung above our desks. I felt as if that election was my own, that it was my fight and completely up me and my friends to save our nation.

I remember that evening, four years ago, when every state had been called but Ohio. I held on to the faith I placed in the American people to keep our nation away from those who would harm it, and I believe that in 2004, the American people did just that.

Unfortunately, I was not as enthusiastic about this year’s election. I wish I had been; tonight would have more meaning for me, whether good or bad. I have so many friends who placed true heart and soul into campaigns this year – two of my friends running statewide campaigns here in North Carolina, and my best friend, now the press secretary for a US Member of Congress. I am so proud of the work they did this year, for giving of themselves for a higher cause. I know over the next few days, they will be catching up on the lives they placed on hold and much needed sleep.

Now, I congratulate our President-elect, Senator Barack Obama. I did not vote for him, but in this moment, I celebrate with him. He ran the best political campaign any American has ever seen. Acknowledging that money equals power and message, he raised three-quarters of $1 billion dollars, at the very least, allowing him the absolute advantage on the campaign trail. I also congratulate Senator John McCain for giving of himself for this cause and ending his run with class and dignity. Republicans, even as they are stereotyped as rich and despised out of an inherent connection to George W. Bush, are graceful in the face of loss and refuse to lose hope, the very message Barack Obama based his entire campaign upon.

Barack Obama is a superior orator, but diplomatically he has proven nothing to me yet, even with four years in the United States Senate. It is David Broder who wrote, “The Senate is not the real world. And voters know it.” Politicians are often disappointing, even those that can rally troops for the cause in millions. I voted against him because I saw no concrete plans to change this nation. I needed more than promises of change. I need actual change. I don’t like what I saw in the past four years, but I am also seasoned enough to know that a lot of what we saw came from those who were quick with words, but made the wrong decisions for the United States.

I hope. Just as Obama asks of us, I hope. I hope he’ll be what we really need. I have faith in the superiority of the human will to progress, but I also know it takes more than just words. As carried away as I can get as an American with power phrases and articulation, I know it takes more than a victory to truly bring about the change that America needs.

I am often teased about always needing to be right. Truth is, I’ve never needed to be right. I have just always had a strong intuition guiding my beliefs. There are things I just know, but cannot explain to you how or why I know them. And usually, I am right. Here’s the thing: I don’t want to be right about President Obama’s future as our commander in chief. I want to believe that the United States will be in successful hands, those entrusted to keep the beacon shining brighter than it ever has. For everyone’s sake in this world, I hope I am wrong. I hope that I am absolutely wrong.

If Barack Obama is not what we need, I hope there will be someone to step up behind him. Until January, when Obama stands on a podium in front of the United States Capitol to take the Oath of Office, I’m going to hope that the people who voted this election cycle realize the true state of our affairs. How important it is that we come together as a nation to free ourselves from tyranny of government and the ignorance of people.

“Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.” | George Washington

“When there’s nothing left to burn, you have to set yourself on fire.” | The Stars, “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead”

Light The Fire Within | Motto for the 2002 Winter Olympics, Salt Lake City, Utah

“Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire.” | Robert Frost, “Fire and Ice”

“Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it’s yours.” | Ayn Rand

“Absence is to love what wind is to fire; it extinguishes the small, it inflames the great.” | Christopher Marlowe

“Genius is initiative on fire.” | Holbrook Jackson

—-

In my world, fire equals passion.

If you’ve ever had something in your life that excited you to the point of tears, a feeling in your heart that burns whenever you’re involved with that thing in some way, you have passion. If you have a voice inside that will not let you stop before you reach your goal, you too have passion. Nothing great was ever achieved without it. So, in a few words, passion equals greatness. Given that passion equals greatness, fire also equals greatness. Therefore, to be great, you must have fire.

If you believe that you don’t have passion, you are wrong. Every single person on this earth has something that rocks their world. It may not be tangible; it may not be something that you’ve ever been in contact with. The fire may be dormant, but it’s still there and it speaks to you.

Most importantly, all these wonderful things that we are passionate about are waiting for you, for me, for everyone. There is endless power in the heat of the fire, and as it rages, you are unstoppable. Believe in your passions, for they fuel the world.

That’s my belief.

This post is quite long, but only because it is an entire chapter from the book Gifted Hands by Dr. Benjamin Carson. I read Gifted Hands as a sophomore in high school when I was discovering that I wanted to be a doctor. I feel that many college students can relate to this passage, maybe not in its entirety but in the pursuit of excellence and the knowledge that we can always strive for more.

—-

I stared at the ten-dollar bill on the table before me, knowing I had to make a choice. And since I had only one chance, I wanted to make sure I made the right one.

For days I’d considered the matter from every possible angle. I’d prayed for God to help me. But it still seemed to come down to making one single decision.

An ironic situation faced me in the fall of 1968, for most of the top colleges in the country had contacted me with offers and enducements. However, each college required a ten-dollar non-refundable entrance fee sent with the application. I had exactly ten dollars, so I could apply to only one.

Looking back I realize that I could have borrowed the money to make several applications. Or, it’s possible that if I’d talked to representatives from the schools they might have waived the fee. But my mother had pushed the concept of self-reliance for so long I didn’t want to start out owing a school just to get accepted.

At that time the University of Michigan – a spectacular school and always in the top ten academically and in sports events – actively recruited Black students. And the University of Michigan waived the fees for in-state students who couldn’t afford to pay. However, I wanted to attend college farther away.

I looked hard at my future, knowing that I could get into any of the top schools but not knowing what to do. Graduating third in my class, I had excellent SAT scores, and most of the top colleges were scrambling to enroll Blacks. After college, with a major in premed and a minor in psychology, I’d be ready for medical school, and at least on the real road toward becoming a doctor.

For a long time it bothered me that I had graduated third in my senior high school class. It’s probably a character flaw, but I can’t help myself. It wasn’t that I had to be first in everything, but I should have been number one. If I hadn’t gotten so sidetracked by the need for peer approval, I would have been at the head of my class. In thinking toward college, I determined that would never happen again. From now on, I’d be the best student I was capable of being.

Several weeks flew by as I struggled over which college to send my application to, and by late spring I had narrowed the choice between Harvard and Yale. Either would have been great, which made the decision difficult. Strangely enough, my final decision hinged on a television program. As I watched College Bowl one Sunday night, the Yale students wiped the Harvard students off the face of the map with a fantastic score of something like 510 to 35. That game helped me to make my decision – I wanted to go to Yale.

In less than a month I not only had my acceptance at Yale to enter in the fall of 1969, but they offered me a 90 percent academic scholarship.

I suppose I should have been elated by the news. I was happy, but not surprised. Actually I took it calmly, and perhaps even a bit arrogantly, reminding myself that I had already accomplished just about everything I’d set out to do – a high scholastic record, top SAT scores, every kind of high school recognition possible, along with my long list of achievements with the ROTC program.

Campus accomodations befitted students of my stature. The student housing was luxurious, the rooms more like suites. The suites included a living room, fireplace, and built-in bookcases. Bedrooms branched off from the main room. Two to four students shared each suite. I had a room to myself.

I strode onto the campus, looked up at the tall, gothic-style buildings, and approved of the ivy-covered walls. I figured I’d take the place by storm. And why not? I was incredibly bright.

After less tha a week on campus I discovered I wasn’t that bright. All the students were bright; many of them extremely gifted and perceptive. Yale was a great leveler for me, because I now studied, worked, and lived with dozens of high-achieving students, and I didn’t stand out among them.

One day I was sitting at the dining room table with several class members who were talking about their SAT scores. One of them said, “I blew the SAT test with a total of just a little over 1500 in both parts.”

“That’s not too bad,” another one sympathized. “Not great, but not bad.”

“What did you get?” the first student asked him.

“Oh, 1540 or 1550, total. I can’t remember my exact math score.”

It seemed perfectly natural to all of them to have scores in the high ninety percentile. I kept silent, realizing that I ranked lower than every student sitting around me. It was my first awareness of not being quite as bright as I thought, and the experience washed away a little of my cockiness. At the same time, the incident only slightly deterred me. It would be simple enough to show them. I’d do what I did at Southwestern and throw myself completely into my studies, learning as much as possible. Then my grades would put me right up in the top echelon.

But I quickly learned that the classwork at Yale was difficult, unlike anything I’d ever encountered at Southwestern High School. The professors expected us to have done our homework before we came to class, then used that information as the basis for the day’s lectures. This was a foreign concept to me. I’d slid through semester after semester in high school, studying only what I wanted, and then, being a good crammer, spent the last few days before exams memorizing like mad. It had worked at Southwestern. It was a shock to realize it wouldn’t work at Yale.

Each day I slipped farther and farther behind in my classwork, especially in chemistry. Why I didn’t work to keep up, I’m not sure. I could give myself a dozen excuses, but they didn’t matter. What mattered was that I didn’t know what was going on in chemistry class.

It all came to a head at the end of the first semester when I faced final examinations. The day before the exam I wandered around the campus, sick with dread. I couldn’t deny it any longer. I was failing freshman chemistry; and failing it badly. My feel scuffed through the golden leaves carpeting the wide sidewalks. Sunlight and shadow danced on ivy-covered walls. But the beauty of that autumn day mocked me. I’d blown it. I didn’t have the slightest hope of passing chemistry, because I hadn’t kept up with the material. As the realization sunk in of my impending failure, this bright boy from Detroit also stared squarely into another horrible truth – if I failed chemistry, I couldn’t stay in the premed program.

Despair washed over me as memories of fifth grade flashed through my mind. “What score did you get, Carson?” “Hey, dummy, did you get any right today?” Years had passed, but I could still hear the taunting voices in my head.

What am I doing at Yale anyway? It was a legitimate question, and I couldn’t push the thought away. Who do I think I am? Just a dumb Black kid from the poor side of Detroit who has no business trying to make it through Yale with all these intelligent, affluent students. I kicked a stone and sent it flying into the brown grass. Stop it, I told myself. You’ll only make it worse. I turned my memories back to those teachers who told me, “Benjamin, you’re bright. You can go places.”

There walking alone in the darkness of my thoughts, I could hear Mother insist, “Bennie, you can do it! Why, son, you can do anything you want, and you can do it better than anybody else. I believe in you.”

I turned and began walking between the tall, classic buildings back to the dorm. I had to study. Stop thinking about failing, I told myself. You can still pull this off. Maybe. I looked up through a scatter of fluttering leaves silhouetted against the rosy autumn sunset. Doubts niggled at the back of my mind.

Finally I turned to God. “I need help,” I prayed. “Being a doctor is all I’ve ever wanted to do, and now it looks like I can’t. And, Lord, I’ve always had the impression You wanted me to be a doctor. I’ve worked hard and focused my life that way, assuming that’s what I was going to do. But if I fail chemistry I’m going to have to find something else to do. Please help me know what else I should do.”

Back in my room, I sank down on my bed. Dusk came early, and the room was dark. The evening sounds of campus filled the quiet room – cars passing, students’ voices in the park below my window, gusts of wind rustling through the trees. Quiet sounds. I sat there, a tall, skinny kid, head in my hands. I had failed. I had finally faced a challenge I couldn’t overcome; I was just too late.

Standing up, I flipped on the desk lamp. “OK,” I said to myself as I paced my room, “I’m going to fail chemistry. So I’m not going to be a doctor. Then what is there for me?”

No matter how many other career choices I considered, I couldn’t think of anything else in the whole world I wanted more than being a doctor. I remembered the scholarship offer from West Point. A teaching career? Business? None of these areas held any real interest.

My mind reached toward God – a desperate yearning, begging, clinging to Him. “Either help me understand what kind of work I ought to do, or else perform some kind of miracle and help me to pass this exam.”

From that moment on, I felt at peace. I had no answer. God didn’t break through my haze of depression and flash a picture in front of me. Yet I knew that whatever happened, everything was going to be all right.

One glimmer of hope – a tiny one at that – shone through my seemingly impossible situation. Although I had been holding on to the bottom run of the class from the first week at Yale, the professor had a rule that might save me. If failing students did well on the final exam, the teacher would throw out most of the semester’s work and let the good final-test score count heavily toward the final grade. That presented the only possibility for me to pass chemistry.

I was nearly 10:00 p.m., and I was tired. I shook my head, knowing that between now and tomorrow morning I couldn’t pull off that kind of miracle.

“Ben, you have to try,” I said aloud. “You have to do everything you can.”

I sat down for the next two hours and pored through my thick chemistry notebook, memorizing formulas and equations that I thought might help. No matter what happened during the exam, I would go into it determined to do the best I could. I’d fail but, I consoled myself, at least I’d have a high fail.

As I scribbled formulas on a paper, forcing myself to memorize what had no meaning to me, I knew deep inside why I was failing. The course wasn’t that tough. The truth lay in something more basic. Despite my impressive academic record in high school, I really hadn’t learned anything about studying. All the way through high school I’d relied on the same old methods – wasting my time during the semester, and then cramming for final exams.

Midnight. The words on the pages blurred, and my mind refused to take in any more information. I flopped into my bed and whispered in the darkness, “God, I’m sorry. Please forgive me for failing You and for failing myself.” Then I slept.

While I slept I had a strange dream, and, when I awakened in the morning, it remained as vivid as if it had actually happened. In the dream I was sitting in the chemistry lecture hall, the only person there. The door opened, and a nebulous figure walked into the room, stopped at the board, and started working out chemistry problems. I took notes of everything he wrote.

When I awakened, I recalled most of the problems, and I hurriedly wrote them down before they faded from memory. A few of the answers actually did fade but, still remembering the problems, I looked them up in my textbook. I knew quite a bit about psychology so assumed I was still trying to work out unresolved problems during my sleep.

I dressed, ate breakfast, and went to the chemistry lecture room with a feeling of resignation. I wasn’t sure if I knew enough to pass, but I was numb from intensive cramming and despair. The lecture hall was huge, filled with individual fold-down wooden seats. It would seat about 1,000 students. In the front of the room chalkboards faced us from a large stage. Also on the stage was a big desk with a countertop and sink for chemistry demonstrations. My steps sounded hollow on the wooden floor.

The professor came in and, without saying much, began to hand out the booklets of examination questions. My eyes followed him around the room. It took him a while to pass out the booklets to 600 students. While I waited, I noticed the way the sun shone through the small panes of the arched windows along one wall. It was a beautiful morning to fail a test.

At least, heart pounding, I opened the booklet and read the first problem. In that instant, I could almost hear the discordant melody that played on TV with The Twilight Zone. In fact, I felt I had entered that never-never land. Hurriedly I skimmed through the booklet, laughing silently, confirming what I suddenly knew. The exam problems were identical to those written by the shadowy dream figure in my sleep.

I knew the answer to every question on the first page. “Piece of cake,” I mumbled as my pencil flew to write the solutions. The first page finished, I turned to the next page, and again the first problem was one I had seen written on the board in my dream. I could hardly believe it.

I didn’t stop to analyze what was happening. I was so excited to know correct answers that I worked quickly, almost afraid I’d lose what I remembered. Near the end of the test, where my dream recall began to weaken, I didn’t get every single problem. But it was enough. I knew I would pass.

“God, You pulled off a miracle.” I told Him as I left the classroom. “And I make a promise to You that I’ll never put You into that situation again.”

I walked around campus for over an hour, elated, yet needing to be alone, wanting to figure out what had happened. I’d never had a dream like that before. Neither had anyone I’d ever known. And that experience contradicted everything I’d read about dreams in my psychological studies.

The only explanation blew me away. The one answer was humbling in its simplicity. For whatever reason, the God of the universe, the God who holds galaxies in His hands, had seen a reason to reach down to a campus room on Planet Earth and send a dream to a discouraged ghetto kid who wanted to become a doctor.

I gasped at the sure knowledge of what had happened. I felt small and humble. Finally I laughed out loud, remembering that the Bible records such events, though they were few – times where God gave specific answers and directions to His people. God had done it for me in the twentieth century. Despite my failure, God had forgiven me and come through to pull of something marvelous for me.

“It’s clear that You want me to be a doctor,” I said to God. “I’m going to do everything within my power to be one. I’m going to learn to study. I promise You that I’ll never do this to You again.”

During my four years at Yale, I did backslide a little, but never to the point of not being prepared. I started learning how to study, no longer concentrating on surface material and just what the professors were likely to ask on finals. I aimed to grasp everything in detail. In just chemistry, for instance, the reasoning behind the formulas. From there, I applied the same principle to all my classes.

After this experience, I had no doubt that I would be a physician. I also had the sense that God not only wanted me to be a physician, but that He had special things for me to do. I’m not sure people always understand when I said that, but I had an inner certainty that I was on the right path in my life – the path God had chosen for me. Great things were going to happen in my life, and I had to do my part by preparing myself and being ready.

When the final chemistry grades came out, Benjamin S. Carson scored 97 – right up there with the top of the class.

I rode a jet ski today and appropriately brought along my blue Croakies for my sunglasses. A dear friend of mine lost her sunglasses after she was thrown off the jet ski. Mine, however, stuck around because of the greatness of the Croakies. Yes, they might seem inappropriate off the water and on college campuses around the nation, but for one moment, mine actually served a purpose. It, clearly, excited me, so much I felt it warranted this post.

Many sympathies to my friend who lost her sunglasses in the water.