Randy Pausch The Last Lecture

The Last Lecture takes the reader into the life of author Randy Pausch. In the book, the stories and concepts that Pausch teaches were all based from his last lecture hence the book being called The Last Lecture. He talks about his childhood and what dreams he had as a child. He goes on and teaches the reader on how he achieved his goals as he went older. He puts out that thinking and dreaming about his childhood puts him a unique place because his own childhood made him the person he was. He mentions that he being a computer scientist and having pancreatic cancer doesn’t make him unique but his childhood. By reading this book, the reader was able to learn a lot from this one person who was struggling in life because of his illness and learns how he was able to get through that.

First, the reader meets Jai, Pausch’s wife, being very unhappy over Pausch’s decision of doing the last lecture at Carnegie Mellon.

She had a huge concern that Pausch would not have the time to have fun with his three children. The reader sympathizes but also disagrees with her unhappiness. The reader sympathizes because Pausch was spending a lot of time on his presentation. Pausch would not see his children for a long time because he had to plan for his lecture. However, he did make an effort to spend time with his kids and eventually did for a good amount of time. Also, Pausch did this last lecture because he wanted it to be saved for his children because this was during the time he was going through the cancer treatments. He knew that his children would not be old enough to remember him. So he did the lecture just so that his children would see what a great man he

was.
Secondly, Pausch discusses that “it's not about how to achieve your dreams. It's about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way…the dreams will come to you.” Pausch is right about this statement. The only way to have a sense of achievement in your lifetime and to have dreams come true is to lead it in the right direction. By working hard, doing the right things and learning from others will help you understand what life is. By learning and understanding the teachings and advice from others, you can implement those teachings and follow them for your own benefit. If the quote were ever to be said in the reverse way, it would be the same. This is because by working hard and achieving great things will lead your life to the right way. Throughout the book, Pausch remembers his childhood dreams with a clear, vivid picture. However, my childhood dreams were not as clear as Pausch’s, but holding onto childhood memories is important because if ever there were to be changed, people can make ask themselves why they want to change their dreams and how this new dream is different from the original dream they dreamt of during their childhood.