#apigrad

API Grad 2017 :)

“The world is but a canvas to our imagination.” -Henry David Thoreau

Friends, family, faculty and staff hi there, hello, hope you’re doing well! Class of 2017, what’s good.

I can’t believe these four years have gone by so quickly. I’m really overjoyed that I get to be your API Graduation student speaker, because this community right here, is the reason I committed to LMU. The world is but a canvas to our imagination and in some ways you have all added to mine. And if you’d let me I’d like to share the ways in which you have made my life more colorful.  Too bad you don’t have a choice.

My favorite color is yellow. I’ve always loved it because it’s bright, exudes warmth, happiness, and is how I would personify myself as a color.

My first year at LMU, I tried to dip my feet in everything to spread my yellow. My impression was that college was about being over-involved and creating a legacy. So freshman year I joined anything I could. I got involved with Han Tao, KASA, Nakolea, IB… every opportunity that I could grasp onto, I firmly grasped it. I was on a mission, but in the process I tired myself out. I wanted to do it all and there’s nothing wrong with that, but I was focusing too much on trying to spread my colors that it became dulled.

In the midst of trying to leave my mark on LMU, I did not realize that my canvas was left bare. I decided that instead of just throwing my colors around, I had to make more genuine interactions and think about what mattered. I reflected on who and what made me happy. I found my home here with the nuggets and mamas of Isang Bansa, with little Manila in McCarthy, and with the lovely losers who entertain my wackiness and trash talk. Once I was able to buckle down and focus on the things I cared about, my yellow became more vibrant and meaningful.

I was no longer throwing paint and hoping it would stick, but finally admiring the art around me. The world is but a canvas to our imagination, and I am in inspired with how diverse each of ours have become. One reason committing to LMU was easy, was because of how each student was able to make LMU their own. The lives of students here are colored with not just our academics, but with passions and talents that they continue to pursue. It is here we’ve learned the Jesuit tradition of cura personalis or the education of the whole person. Here at LMU we have sociology majors who ball, bio majors who sing, engineers who dance and people who continue to chase the things they love on and off the bluff, which has inspired me to keep doing what I love. I love to create art. Being in this supportive and driven community has inspired me keep creating art and this year I have started to share it with the world. S/O @seannamdoodles!  

The world is but a canvas to our imagination and I want to thank all of you for making mine so beautiful. My favorite color is yellow, but it’s also you, it’s all of you. It’s the blend of late nights in MCC, sleepovers in the library or leavey 4 or whoever will let me stay, it’s the hues of hallway talks until 5am and roast sessions at Sawtelle, the pigments of recklessness and fun we’ve had these past four years that no other experiences will be able to replicate. My canvas is stained with colors that don’t really have a name and memories that make it so hard to say goodbye. Even as we move off the bluff and make room for the colors to come, the strokes left from LMU will never be overwritten. My canvas is beautiful and it’s abstract and it will always remind me of all of you, of this community, and of my time as a lion here on the bluff.

The world is but a canvas to our imagination and you have all made mine brighter.

Thank you class of 2017 and to all of you here.

Congrats friends, we did it!!!