Randy Pausch's The Last Lecture

In the book, The Last Lecture, Randy Pausch is dying from pancreatic cancer and is only given a few months to live. With the time he has left, he makes it his priority to spend it wisely. Pausch states that he has an engineering problem and he’s going to do his best with his limited resources. His engineering problem is his health. Even though his body is failing him, he is going to push through and overcome the new obstacles he is facing in life. Pausch is also faced with “brick walls” but he doesn’t give up when things get tough. He uses the brick walls as an opportunity to show how badly he wants whatever is blocking his path. My “engineering problem” is being able to afford college for as long as I can. I’d say that my “brick walls”

“Hypothetically, if you knew you were going to die and you had one last lecture, what would you say to your students?” That is how Professor Randy Pausch, from Carnegie Mellon, began his last lecture, a speech entitled “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams” while in fact he was dying of Pancreatic Cancer. He knew he only had months left to live and put together this last lecture to read to his students. His lecture focuses in on points such as the importance of: making sincere apologies, not whining, being gracious and being humble. To stress his thoughts and views on life and following one’s dreams, Randy Pausch used a great amount of repetition, metaphors, allusion, humor, ethos, and pathos in his last lecture.

In Randy Pausch 's "Last Lecture," Randy discusses how he achieved all of his childhood dreams throughout his life and how he helped others achieve their dreams. Often times, childhood dreams are forgotten due to life stressors, other opportunities and interests that come along and, ultimately, believing that those childhood dreams are unachievable. However, this was not the case for Randy Pausch. Randy created a list of things that he desired to experience throughout his lifetime, and through persistency, acceptance and some modification, he was able to complete his list. Similar to many children 's "being an astronaut" dream, Randy had a couple dreams that seemed impossible. These seemingly impossible dreams on Randy 's list included: "being in zero gravity," "playing in the NFL," and "being Captain Kirk." While Randy never received the opportunity to play football for the NFL, his understanding and lessons learned from his football experiences made up for this shortcoming. Nonetheless, Randy was able to conquer all of his other dreams. With each dream Randy discusses, he explains each "brick wall" he hit along his way and what he did to get around these walls.

You would think a man dying of cancer would not be so happy and willing to spend the last few months of his life giving a lecture. But, Randy Pausch, who has 10 tumors in his liver, does not want people to pity him for having cancer. Rather, he wants to teach people how to follow their childhood dreams. Looking at the seven elements of communication we see how he is so effective in his last lecture.

He told me a story of a friend he had who had cancer and she made the choice to stop the chemotherapy. Her arms had scabs and she decided enough was enough. She knew she wasn’t going to get better. She talked about death as if she were going to a party. He described how she appeared to be at peace because she lived a fulfilling life. Mr. E felt that she encouraged and motivated him more than he to her.Mr. E felt that the greatest joys of getting older were family and seeing it grow. He also felt that being loved and having others think highly of you were great achievements.Looking back on his life Mr. E felt that the only thing he could have done differently was to be more patient, smarter, more humane and not make as many mistakes. “You look back and think that you were not able to see things that are obvious” (E. Privacy, personal communication, October 10, 2012).

What would you do if you had limited time left to live? Many people take life for granted but when their life is suddenly compressed into a matter of weeks left, they soon realize the beauty of life and how they lived it. In response to his restricted time left caused by pancreatic cancer, writer Randy Pausch argues that life should be lived to the fullest in his book The Last Lecture.He effectively builds his claim through the use of pathos, allusions to literature, and metaphors.

Dr. Randy Pausch, a professor of computer science at Carnegie-Mellon University who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, educated me with his powerful inspirational message. Dr. Randy Pausch, 47 years old man who has terminal cancer with a life expectancy of a few months gave me a life lesson. He thought me how to achieve dreams also how to face death. Being diagnosed with any kinds of cancer is devastating and despairing, but for him it was opposite; he was happy and cognitively healthy during his final lecture at Carnegie-Mellon University. He even said, “If I don 't seem as depressed or morosed as I should be, sorry to disappoint you” (Video) and continued lecturing. He hadn’t show any sadness or depression during his lecture

In the novel, The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch with Jeffrey Zaslow, Pausch recalls painting his bedroom walls after the permission of his parents. If my parents gave me permission to paint my bedroom walls, I would first paint on my favorite quotes on one wall. They could be quotes from my favorite books, movies, or important historical figures. For example, Mahatma Gandhi’s quote, “Be the change you wish to see in the world,” is a quote that I have to remember to follow when I am afraid to become a leader and change what needs to be changed in life. Basically, the quotes would be up on the wall just so I can look at them everyday for inspiration, or when I need them when I hit rock bottom. In addition, I would paint on all the ideas and hobbies

A seminar series titled “The Last Lecture” took place at Carnegie Mellon University. Professors were prompted to deliver lectures as if it was their last, while containing a “message of a lifetime”. Professor Randy Pausch delivered his speech titled “Achieving Your Childhood Dreams” as a part of this seminar on September 18th, 2007, a time in which had just been given life-threatening news. It had recently been estimated by doctors that this was the last three to six months of his life. Instead of speaking as if he was hypothetically dying like his fellow professors, Pausch was in an extremely ironic situation, as for in his case he really was dying, of pancreatic

“College for the Masses” by David Leonhardt is a great article that displays the many benefits among lower-income students attending a four year college. “Why Poor Students Struggle” by Vicki Madden displays many examples from hers and her colleagues experiences while providing statistics of the lower-income joining a four year college. The two articles both display the benefits of attending a four year college and that the education pays off. David’s article talked about the different education levels based on their test score before attending the university and the amount of income, while Vicki’s focused more on the income and the effects on grades of students while attending the college on low income. David also goes more in detail about the disadvantages of community college than Vicki’s description of community college. “College for the Masses”, in my opinion, had more intensive descriptions and examples on the benefits of starting in a four year university, rather than community college.

Randy Pausch being put down with bad news all the time what can you do to bring you up you let go and face reality there is nothing you can do to fix it but hope for the best but even that is not enough to be satisfying in today life but what can you do there not a lot you can do to fix your problem but you can try with the time you have left to be close to your family but with Randy he decided to make a presentation instead of focusing on his family and he wrote a great book telling his live to his kids and the world show how he became to be the man that once had everything he can wish for turn around now has nothing in this world. He now losing everything little by little it’s sad to go down like this when you have kids that will not remember

Randy Pausch gives advice to his students in his last lecture. Use examples from his lecture to answer the question: What is good advice? Your answer should be an essay with two or three body paragraphs and quotes from the text to illustrate your thinking. Follow the RACER format.

Imagine for a second. In the midst of your 30’s enjoying what life has to offer. After all those years of being in school and putting in the hard work, a dream job was finally achieved. Along with that, a spouse and a loving family is also given. Life may be challenging but it brings many rewards. It seems like a rollercoaster that never stops going up, life couldn’t get any better. However, happily ever afters aren’t always as they seem. At a regular doctor checkup, horrifying news is told. A brain tumor has been growing for who knows how many months and terminal brain cancer is diagnosed. The doctors say that life will end abruptly in 2-4 years, the process is slow and extremely painful. What are the options? People who are

A terminal illness can generally be defined as an illness for which there is no cure and the prognosis is fatal. We all know that we will die someday but most of us think of this as some distant time. For individuals who have been diagnosed with a terminal illness, though, they must face the reality of their own mortality and are forced to re-evaluate their lives and must make choices about how to best spend the remainder of their days. For the purposes of this paper I am focusing on the cultural differences between how American society copes with a terminal illness and how Jewish American’s cope. Coping with a terminal illness is not unique to any particular culture. How an individual reacts and prepares for their own inevitable

Right brain? Left brain? Both sides are very different and have their own characteristics that help determine what a persons potential strengths and weaknesses will be. “The human brain is split into two halves, each with its own unique abilities. This phenomenon, discovered three decades ago by Nobel Prize winner Dr. Roger Sperry and his associates at the California Institute of Technology, is known as brain lateralization” (Raudsepp, 1992, p. 85). Certain characteristics of a person can go so much deeper then just hobbies that a person enjoys. Brain function can play a major role in how a person perceives their surroundings, such as if someone like to draw or do math. On the other side of that if a person is very analytical and good at subjects in school such as math it could be linked to which side of their brain is dominant.