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Natalie Portman Harvard Commencement Speech | Harvard Commencement 2015
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[APPLAUSE]
NATALIE PORTMAN: Hello, class of 2015.
I am so honored to be here today.
Dean Khurana, faculty, parents, and, most especially,
graduating students, thank you so much for inviting me.
The senior class committee-- it's
genuinely one of the most exciting things
I've ever been asked to do.
I have to admit primarily, because I can't deny it--
as it was leaked in the Wikileaks release of the Sony
hack--
that when I was invited, I replied.
And I directly quote my own email.
"Wow, this is so nice.
I'm going to need some funny ghostwriters.
Any ideas?"
[LAUGHTER]
This initial response, now blessedly public,
was from the knowledge that at my class day,
we were lucky enough to have Will Ferrell as Class Day
speaker, and that many of us, hungover or even freshly high,
mainly wanted to laugh.
So I have to admit that today, even 12 years after graduation,
I'm still insecure about my own worthiness.
I have to remind myself today, you are here for a reason.
Today, I feel much like I did when I came to Harvard yard
as a freshman in 1999, when you guys were, to my continued shock
and horror, still in kindergarten.
I felt like there had been some mistake,
that I wasn't smart enough to be in this company,
and that every time I opened my mouth,
I would have to prove I wasn't just a dumb actress.
So I start with an apology.
This won't be very funny.
I'm not a comedian, and I didn't get a ghostwriter.
But I am here to tell you today, Harvard
is giving you all diplomas tomorrow.
You are here for a reason.
Sometimes your insecurities and your inexperience
may lead you to embrace other people's expectations,
standards, or values.
But you can harness that inexperience
to carve out your own path, one that
is free of the burden of knowing how things are supposed to be,
a path that is defined by its own particular set of reasons.
The other day, I went to an amusement park
with my soon-to-be four-year-old son.
And I watched him play arcade games.
He was incredibly focused, throwing his ball at the target.
Jewish mother that I am, I skipped 20 steps
and was already imagining him as a Major League player with,
what, his aim, and his arm, and his concentration.
But then I realized that when he won,
he was playing to trade in his tickets
for the crappy plastic toys.
The prize was much more exciting than the game to get it.
I, of course, wanted to urge him to take joy
in the challenge of the game, the improvement of practice,
the satisfaction of doing something well, and even feeling
the accomplishment when achieving the game's goals.
But all of these aspects were shaded by the little $0.10
plastic men with sticky, stretchy blue arms that adhere
to the walls.
That was the prize.
In a child's nature, we see many of our own innate tendencies.
I saw myself in him, and perhaps you do too.
Prizes serve as false idols everywhere-- prestige, wealth,
fame, power.
You will be exposed to many of these, if not all.
Of course, part of why I was invited to come speak today,
beyond my being a proud alum, is that I've
accrued some very coveted toys in my life,
including a not-so-plastic, not-so-crappy one, an Oscar.
So we bump up against a common trope,
I think, of the commencement address,
people who have achieved a lot, telling you
that the fruits of achievement are not always to be trusted.
But I think that contradiction can be reconciled
and is, in fact, instructive.
Achievement is wonderful when you know why you're doing it.
And when you don't know, it can be a terrible trap.
I went to a public high school on Long Island--
Syosset High School.
[CHEERING]
Ooh, hello, Syosset.
The girls I went to school with had Prada bags
and flat-ironed hair.
And they spoke with an accent I, who had moved there at age nine
from Connecticut, mimicked to fit in--
Florida oranges, chocolate cherries.
Since I'm ancient and the internet was just
starting when I was in high school,
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