This Is Water David Foster Wallace Commencement Speech

Summary

David Foster Wallace's 2005 Kenyon College commencement speech, "This Is Water," explores the importance of critical thinking and conscious awareness beyond the typical pursuit of knowledge. He uses parables to highlight how essential, yet often unseen, truths affect our daily lives, urging graduates to choose compassion and understanding over their natural default setting of self-centeredness. The speech critiques societal worship of money, power, and intellect, advocating instead for a deliberate choice of what to worship, emphasizing that true freedom lies in awareness, empathy, and sacrifice—a lifelong education.

Highlights

The Meaning of 'This Is Water'00:00:11

Wallace opens with the 'fish story' to illustrate that the most obvious and important realities are often the hardest to see. He explains that 'teaching you how to think' in a liberal arts education isn't about the capacity to think, but rather about the choice of what to think about, urging graduates to challenge their default perceptions.

Challenging Blind Certainty00:02:40

Using a parable about a religious person and an atheist in a blizzard, Wallace discusses how two people can interpret the same experience differently based on their belief systems. He critiques 'blind certainty' and 'arrogance,' suggesting that a true education fosters critical awareness of one's own certainties and a willingness to be less arrogant about one's interpretations of reality.

The Default Setting: Self-Centeredness00:05:53

Wallace asserts that our natural 'default setting' is self-centeredness, where we believe we are the absolute center of the universe. He argues that the real value of a liberal arts education is to learn how to actively choose to alter this default setting, to become 'well-adjusted' by exercising control over how and what we think, rather than being enslaved by our own minds.

Everyday Annoyances and Conscious Choice00:09:37

He describes mundane adult frustrations, like grocery shopping and traffic, as opportunities to practice conscious awareness. Instead of allowing these situations to trigger anger and self-pity, he suggests choosing to view them differently—considering the possibility of others' struggles or exercising empathy, even when it's difficult.

The Freedom of Awareness and What to Worship00:17:34

Wallace concludes by emphasizing that true freedom comes from conscious awareness and the deliberate choice of what to worship. He contends that everyone worships something, and if it's not a spiritual or ethical principle, then the worship of money, beauty, intellect, or power will ultimately lead to dissatisfaction and a continuous feeling of inadequacy. The 'capital-T Truth' of education is about active awareness in life before death, a lifelong job of staying conscious and alive.