A Life Defined By Randy Pausch

He inspired his students in their classroom discussions…. touched the lives of strangers who read his book The Last Lecture…. and reached out to the corners of the world when his lecture found its way to the internet. His subject, LIFE. And what better way to discuss it than to share his very own. At 47 he had fatal cancer. Pancreatic Cancer.

I am not one of his computer science students. I have not gone to any of his lectures. I have not even read his book. But surely, I am one of the millions of people who are touched and inspired by Randy Pausch when he appeared for an interview on ABC by Diane Sawyer aired last April.

He was a professor and a son. A member of a faculty and a friend. But if there is one role that he was so proud to portray in his lifetime, that was being a husband and a father. In an Inspirational Speech that he delivered two months ago before the graduates of the the Carnegie Mellon University he was very proud to incorporate his lovestory in a nutshell. In his words, “I waited til 39 to get married because I had to wait that long to find someone where her happiness is more important than mine.” When he ended his speech, he walked to where his wife was standing, and gave her a long kiss in front of the cheering crowd.

When he was first told he had cancer, he accepted it. He said he was unlucky, but it wasn’t unfair. But being a father of three children (ages five, two and one) he couldn’t help but feel sad because “they won’t have me for them.” In that April interview my heart was crushed looking at this very young father. But most of all I had a difficult time containing my emotion when I saw how young his kids were. In a beautiful figure of speech he shared his worry with these words saying: “Somebody’s gonna push my family off the cliff pretty soon; and I won’t be there to catch them. And that breaks my heart. But I have some time to sew some nets to cushion the fall. And that seems like the best to make use of my time. So I can either curl up in a ball or I can get to work on those nets.”

Surely this man had found a better way to see life and living it. And he did not just stop there. Instead, he inspired people from different walks of life until they find their own awakening. And when he spoke before the graduates of CMU, he left them a cliche’ on living life well: “It’s not the things we do in life that we regret on our deathbed, it’s the things we do not.”

Then yesterday, students lost a professor. A wife lost her husband. The three kids lost their father. But for many of us who were touched by his lecture, we gained a new meaning in life as defined by Randy Pausch. In his last years, he was able to “put myself in a bottle that would one day wash up on the beach for my children.” And even after his death, his lessons will become a legacy for the people who heard him. May we always be reminded that “We don’t beat the (grim) reaper by living longer. We beat the reaper by living well, and living fully. For the reaper will come for all of us. The question is, what do we do during the time we’re born and the time he shows up. Coz when he shows up it’s too late to do all the things that you always gonna kinda get around to.”

***be among the 3.2 million people he touched and viewed his “Last Lecture”