Conan O’Brien’s Tonight Show stint is at an end. I haven’t watched late night television in something like a decade, but I watched him in the years after he took over for Letterman. If you’re interested in watching the speech, just click here to execute a google search.
The full text of his speech can be found here. This has nothing to do with long-term thinking, but I wanted to post it because of what he said toward the end.
To all the people watching, I can never thank you enough for your kindness to me and I’ll think about it for the rest of my life. All I ask of you is one thing: please don’t be cynical. I hate cynicism — it’s my least favorite quality and it doesn’t lead anywhere.
This is a clear warning from a Gen-X’er – who was surrounded by that cynicism – to his Millenenial juniors. We Gen X’ers played the cynicism card in the face of life’s difficult reality. I can attest personally to the ease with which we wrapped ourselves up in the “pfshhht” sound.
It was clearly a callout to our kids, bypassing the acid that may be passing from the lips of their parents.
Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen.
