In fact, planning is something I’d like to talk about this evening. What plan are you on? At Rice we have plans. We have meal plans, we have insurance plans, we have course plans. We have floor plans, parking plans and we have strategic plans. I could go on and on about the various plans that exist. Over the next week, and during the course of your time at Rice, you will have many opportunities to discuss and decide and debate among plans. As an active member of this community, you will have the opportunity to help construct plans, to change plans and even to terminate the plans that you think are no good. But this isn’t quite what I’m talking about tonight. Tonight I’m here to talk about the lentil stew. Yes, the lentil stew. But I’ll come back to that later.

Life offers us very few opportunities to completely shed one structure and to occupy a new one. We are humans, not arthropods. We don’t get to molt very often. This is a time to take stock of who you are and what you are about. This is a time when the definitions of others do not yet define you. Consider where the "authentic you" is. Shed any external skeletons that don’t really fit…things that you may have acquired, or to which you adapted, within a previous structure. If they don’t fit, shed them. And no one here will know that you did. Are you planning a triple major at Rice because you’ve always been a superachiever and folks expect that you will continue? Or do you really, truly, personally have a death-wish? If you really have a death wish, then do a triple major at Rice. If you are thinking about a triple major because it is part of the baggage you may have brought with you, then consider shedding that. Do you already know what your major is going to be because you chose it? Or because someone else expects it? Who defined who you were in high school? Were certain skills, behaviors, and attitudes expected of you then because of "who you were"? Those definitions of you don’t yet exist here. They will. Slowly but surely this structure will come to understand you and to interact with you and you will come to understand this structure and interact with it. As part of a natural process, the definition of who you are will become molded by, and enmeshed with, where you are. An organism that molts does so quickly, and there is a right time for the process. It happens when the old materials have been outgrown, or overused, or are no longer suitable. It is often a vulnerable time. It is a time, perhaps, of perceived or real risk. But vulnerable or not, there is no growing room until the unnecessary carapace is left behind. Shed what you need to shed, because you will wear this new structure for quite a while. This is the time. In life’s transitions, you’ve just entered the first big molt. And it’s worth thinking about.

I had no problem coming up with long term goals, although coming up with five long term goals was kind of hard. When it came to important things, I was a "one-goal" person. And the big one on the 10-year plan was to become a university professor. It is interesting that I set the goal of becoming a professor long before I had a clue what my major would be. I was going to be a professor of… something. I am, by the way, living proof that you can survive four semesters of holidays at home announcing a new major every time. Believe me, my parents just loved the conversations. We’d sit down around another lovely holiday meal and I would describe my latest lovely idea for a major. I ultimately settled on geology, and that was good because it filled in the "something" part of the "professor" part of the 10-year plan. Having set my 10-year plan, the 5-year plan was completely determined. Predetermined. I was headed to graduate school. That is what you did if you wanted to become a university professor. Now, my 24-hour plan was to get a huge pile of laundry done so that I wouldn’t have to go buy new clothes (that I couldn’t afford) and thereby run out of money needed to finish my undergraduate degree… so that I could graduate and go to graduate school and get a PhD… so that I could hunt for a job and become a university professor. And I’m not trying to be silly. What I realized that day was that my entire short term view was focused on the most direct route to the big plan. I was on a freight train, a freight train of my own making, headed as directly as possible toward that destination some 10 years down the track. And I was quite suspicious of any distraction or diversion that might deflect that linear course. And, by the way, I would never have tried something as suspicious looking as lentil stew.

I kept reading between the lines and the situation got worse. I was following a sinister little unwritten agenda that said "don’t spend much time on anything that doesn’t contribute to the grand plan." Perhaps if my grand plan had been a bit more encompassing (like, for instance, save the world), I could have been happy with that. But my grand plan was pretty narrowly focused. I, therefore, was pretty narrowly focused and directly driven. The validity of the short term was for me defined on the basis of whether or not it fit constructively into the long term picture. Did it do me any good, or not, getting on down the pike? One of the greatest gifts I ever gave myself was to more fully open the doors to the present, and to reward myself for seeing and doing small things that had no obvious relevance to the big plan. At least not to my big plan. There are other big plans out there, and playing a small part in someone (or something) else’s grand plan is something we should all consider. Certainly, there is tremendous enrichment in life when you realize that things exist, not beyond the big plan, but in front of the big plan. That there is not one path to the 10-year goal, but that there are many paths. And that the diversions and distractions along these paths are what we call the living part.

So what do I want from you? I think I’ll be lucky to get two things out of you guys tonight…but I rarely leave a talk like this without extracting something. I want you to spend time with yourself this week (and that wont be easy…). I want you to focus on the shape of your 24-hour, your 5-year, and your 10-year plans. You might even hang onto the list for a while… comparisons over time can be instructive (and even downright funny). And while you’re doing this I want you to consider what external shells you’d like to shed. Quick, molt now…before, by your own actions, you sell anyone here on something about you that is outgrown, or overused, or that doesn’t suit you.

Now, as for lentil stew. Here’s how I see it. When I was a college master, I set a personal goal…let’s see that would have been item #4 on my 5-year college master plan… and I obnoxiously pursued this goal. The goal was that every student in my college at least try the lentil stew before graduation. It was basically ugly, but it tasted very good and I knew in my heart that it was good for them. That’s how I feel about this exercise tonight. You may think this "molting thing," this "goals thing," is basically ugly, but it is really quite good, and I know in my heart that it is good for you. So, here’s the link. When you see lentil stew being served in the college, that’s your signal from me to stop and ponder what plan you are on. Evaluate your goals and, most importantly, read between the lines. Where is the list easy to fill out? Where is it tough to fill out? Where is it superficial? Where is it filled in by somebody else? And on at least one of those occasions, you have to actually try the lentil stew. For my part in this, I’ll ask CK not to serve this lentil stuff more than once a week (leftovers don’t count). That way you won’t have to think too often. And I’ll keep an eye on my e-mail. You let me know when you’ve tried the lentil stew, and I’ll be sure your lentil stew requirement is cleared for graduation. Just think, you could have one of your graduation requirements completed before Thanksgiving…if you’re brave enough.