Flippin’

Randy Pausch is a professor of Carnegie Mellon Computer Science. He is also interested in virtual reality, where you make a world in a cyberworld. For example, he is the inventor of 3D animation software called Allice. Currently, he is 47 years old father with 3 kids. They are 2, 3, and 6 year olds. However, Randy Pausch has Terminal Pancreatic Cancer and was told in August 2007 to expect to have only remaining three to six months of good health. Then he was given to do a last lecture before he die. September 18 2007, hundreds of people came all the way to CMU to be part of his last lecture. With a welcoming standing ovation in the beginning of the lecture, he did his inspirational last lecture infront his students, his family, and his friends.

He began his lecture by saying “when there is an elephant in the room, introduce them” and he showed his CAT scans about his tumors. Also he said he apologize to people who thought that the lecture was gonna be gloomy one. In order to prove that he is healthy other than tumors inside his body, he also showed some clapping pushups. His “Last Lecture” was full of humour that I began to forget that he is suffering with cancer.

The lecture was not about his cancer. It was more about telling people to achieve their childhood dreams. He mentioned some of the childhood dreams that he had. Here are some of his childhood dreams.

-Being in zero gravity

-Playing National Football League

-Authoring an article in the World Book of Encyclopedia

-Being Captain Kirk

-Being an imagineer with Disney

-Winning a stuffed animals from amusement park.

In fact, he achieved all of his childhood dreams.

Here is some of the stuff he mentioned on his last lecture.

“The brick walls are
there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us
a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the
people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.”

“It’s not about how to achieve your
dreams. It’s about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care
of itself. The dreams will come to you.”

“These slides (he showed some slides) are a little bit dark, but when I was in high school I
decided to paint my bedroom. [shows slides of bedroom] I always wanted a submarine and an
elevator. And the great thing about this is they let me do it. And
they didn’t get upset about it. And it’s still there. If you go to my parent’s house it’s still there. And anybody who is out there who is a parent, if your kids want to paint their bedroom, as a favor to me
let them do it. It’ll be OK. Don’t worry about resale value on the house.” Painting a room is to spread out children’s imagination”

Also before he ended his speech, he said that the speech is not for the people who was watching the lecture, but it was for his 3 kids, where they will see this lecture when they grow up.

I have my own childhood dream. I wanted to become a Taxi driver, wanted to live in a deserted island and try to survive by myself, wanted to participate in marathon, and I wanted to become an airline pilot. I thought I was never gonna achieve my own childhood dream. However, after this inspirational speech, I decided to do my best to achieve my childhood dream before I die.