Good morning, Shipley! It is Spirit Week, and I am proud to say that this year—more than ever before—we have coordinated the Lower, Middle, and Upper Schools into one giant blob of blue and green spirit. While the Middle and Upper Schools have been enjoying Spirit Week for generations, the Lower School has only recently been brought on board. I was lucky enough to have been the one to enlighten the Lower School Student Council on the wild and crazy fun times that older kids have during Spirit Week.

I had a meeting with the 5th grade student leaders and found it to be a bit comical. As I described one of the Upper School traditions, the Mr. and Ms. Shipley dating competition, one of my esteemed 10-year-old colleagues posed a very good question: What exactly is a date? I proceeded to describe the situation of a boy and a girl eating dinner together and holding hands as they take a romantic stroll down the street. As each of my colleagues began to understand what I was describing, I saw each and every face lining the boardroom table turn from youthful glee, to total and complete horror. This was a stark contrast to the freshman boys gathered around me panting like dogs as I described for them the same situation.

Sprit Week is a time when we see something that is not very characteristic of Shipley, competition. I have found in all my time at Shipley, and especially during my time as President, that Shipley often strives to create a cooperative situation rather than a competitive one. While I am in no way condemning the mission of the school that I love so much, I would be lying if I told you that I don’t believe there is real value in learning to step out of your comfort zone and face the possibility of failure. Outside of this comfort zone is a place where we risk disappointment, but it is also the only place where any of us face the possibility of doing something truly extraordinary.

Only just a few weeks ago I found myself and my close buddies on the squash team in a fierce battle against Lower Merion. We had beaten them soundly the first time we played them a month and a half earlier, but the stakes were such that, if we lost, we ran the risk of losing the League Championship, which earns us a banner on the wall of Yarnall Gym. I was one of the later matches to go on, and I walked on the court absolutely confident and ready to win, but nonetheless, outside of my comfort zone.

Naturally, my attitude was slightly different as I walked back off the court having lost the first game in about 7 or 8 minutes.
But I showed no emotion. As far as my opponent was able to tell, I was just as confident as when I walked on. In reality I was very afraid. I was afraid of letting my team down, I was afraid of letting myself down, and I was afraid of the embarrassment of a loss.

The second, third, and fourth games were all very long and very close. When I came off of the court huffing and puffing after the fourth, the score was tied and I was exhausted both mentally and physically. I heard the applause for the end of the match next door. Unfortunately, that applause was for the Lower Merion player, and as it turned out the Shipley squad found itself facing the possibility of a loss. My match became a major deciding factor.

I came on the court for that last game more motivated than ever. I took immediate control and a gigantic lead of 7-0. I put my opponent all over the court. I put him in front of me; I put him behind me. Sometimes I had him literally doing circles around me. This was great until he won a point. And after that point, he did not lose another the entire game. He staged a huge comeback to beat me 9-7 and win the match.
I don’t care whether you’ve ever played or heard of squash in your life. I don’t care if you have never heard of sports in your life. If you are a scholar, a musician, or an artist it doesn’t matter, you know what it is to lose. You know that feeling of having let yourself and the people around you down, because you could not succeed.

It turns out that, despite the tough loss against LM, the squash team did end up winning the League. We won the League, but I am not up here talking to you about our winning match, because I did not learn half as much when I won a match as I did when I lost. Regardless of the context, the act of losing and turning around to try again is one of the most courageous and educational experiences a person can have. Most importantly, if I had not ever stepped on the court in the first place, I would never have faced the possibility of success. If I had never stepped out of my comfort zone and taken a risk, then I would never have even given myself the opportunity to learn or to grow.

Every single day that you wake up, you have the opportunity to shove your hand in the air when nobody else wants to. You have the opportunity to tell that boy or girl that you’re in love with how you feel. You have the opportunity to sing out in chorus even though nobody wants his voice to be heard. I truly believe that you and I and even the faculty literally have the opportunity to change the way that we live every single day. Sometimes you will drop the ball, sometimes you will really drop the ball, and sometimes you will meet the most amazing person who has been sitting right next to you in math class for six months. There is no better place to take a risk than the overwhelmingly supportive environment at Shipley, and I urge you every day to step out of that monotonous place of comfortable routine and take a risk by stepping into the place where leaders are born.