From the Dean

On May 24, 2023, Jefferson President and SKMC Dean Mark Tykocinski, MD, shared the following comments with the graduates at Jefferson’s 199th commencement ceremony. Parts of his remarks are drawn from previous commencement speeches. His address appears in lieu of his usual column.

The timing of this graduation is quite special. It comes as a once-in-a-century pandemic has been declared over. You—the Class of 2023—were at the educational epicenter of this global trauma, which struck in the Spring of your first year. During this time, you learned a profound lesson in the power of resilience—and no doubt, you will apply this knowledge for the rest of your personal and professional lives.

Despite the surrealness of the pandemic, and the challenges posed by it, you have continued to dream—to imagine the possible, to frame aspirations, and to talk of breaking boundaries. All that you have accomplished here speaks to it—your achievements under our groundbreaking JeffMD curriculum; your co-curricular engagement with Medicine+ programs fostering cross-cutting ways of thinking; your wealth of extracurricular activities—multifaceted community outreach, Physician Executive Leadership—or my own passion project, the Dean’s Student Leadership Forum, which allowed me to meet face-to-face with some of you in sessions spanning three years.

So, it’s fair to now ask: What propels us to transcend artificial boundaries, regardless of the challenges? And what can you, Class of 2023, learn from your Jefferson experience and take forward?

For an answer, I look to my wife’s late uncle. Uncle Ralph would close his letters with the phrase “The Wind is Free”—in place of a signature. The word free suited him well. Notwithstanding his splurge on the sailing yacht he himself designed and financed, this well-to-do Connecticut real estate developer was otherwise remarkably low-key. At black tie events, he wore a scissor-cut black nautical rope in lieu of formal bow tie – a free bow tie, if you will.

For decades, no one thought to ask Uncle Ralph what he really meant by “The Wind is Free.” Not long before he passed, I posed the question. Some weeks later, I received two handwritten pages, with a message in line with his passion for the sea, from this sailor, who had been on a U.S. Navy staging warship at the Normandy landing on D-Day:

“The wind is a force that cannot be bought. One can easily buy the boat, but one cannot buy the wind that will take you to your destination. One will have to contend with obstacles such as storms, depressing calms, and strong winds. One may need money to buy the boat, intelligence to direct the boat, but the ultimate “force” to move the boat is something that nobody can buy. This is the wind that is free, and this is the wind that carries a person to their destination.”

How insightful and true these words are!

As you now set sail for the open and wholly uncharted waters of your personal and professional lives, carry with you the essence of this message. The wind—the forces that motivate and drive—will differ for each of you. For some, sheer ambition; for others, payback to loved ones who sacrificed to pave your way; for others, nobility of the mission. Your wind will comprise those forces that foster creativity and unleash curiosity. Let your free spirit soar.

These forces share something in common—they are cultivated from within, free of charge. They are not purchased or dependent on others. This inner wind is free in abundance to lift you into flight, at times to great heights. The only thing required is that you consciously direct this wind, come to understand it, tap into it, and apply it with purpose.

I know that this message resonates with you. One proof point—the wealth of independent and imaginative Scholarly Inquiry and JeffDesign projects that have emanated from your class are a testament to how our university has given you a sense of what directing that wind in the sails feels like.

I’d offer yet another interpretation of free. Wind is not just free of charge. Wind is also free of constraint. It blows freely, in all directions, pushing obstacles aside, or simply skirting around them.

True professionals—physicians, scientists—must allow their inner wind to operate free of constraints from others. They must look past critiques and not need or require external validation. As your creativity unfolds, know that you will at times have to withstand critiques, sometimes biased, on the way to the recognition of your innovation. Those graduate students who have had to withstand critical reviews of their scientific manuscripts, or medical students who have floated some paradigm-defying idea in a small group session to quizzical onlookers, have already experienced this. It takes guts to put yourself out there and to stick to your convictions. Sometimes it will mean operating in loneliness as others catch up.

But independence does not mean being a lone wolf. Quite the contrary. Collaboration is paramount. Converging winds gather greater force. Teamwork draws on a collection of imaginations and experience, powered by free flow of intelligence. The key here is balancing the benefits of the converging winds with the simultaneous need to protect your own creative winds.

Point #1: The wind to propel you is there for you to harness. Point #2: Don’t let others deflate or misdirect your wind power.

Let me suggest a third perspective on “The Wind is Free.”

Paul Klee’s “Angelus Novus” watercolor drawing portrays an angel being blown forward by stormy winds, all the while facing backward. The German-Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin, who bought the drawing in 1921, imagined this as the angel of history.

In an iconic essay, he described Klee’s angel as follows: “His face is turned toward the past. Where we perceive a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe, which keeps piling wreckage upon wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet ..… The storm irresistibly buffets him into the future to which his back has turned, while the pile of debris before him mounts skyward. This storm is what we call progress.”

Class of 2023—resist being this backward-looking angel of history, focused on the faults of the past and ignoring a future landscape replete with possibility. As your wind propels you, face forward, relentlessly reaching for the positive the future holds. Learning from the past is not being mired in the past. As healers, you are obligated to hard-wire for optimism. We are a species capable of awe, of appreciating the grandeur of nature and human life. See beyond the horizon of your own lives, to the glimmer of things that are greater. I say this as the son of two Auschwitz survivors—whose nuclear families were decimated in the Holocaust—yet, through sheer will, powered themselves, forward-facing, to embrace a positive life for themselves and their children.

Admittedly, there is an irresistible draw to be a backward-facing angel of history. The groupthink of intellectual monocultures and political tribalism—powered by the curse of connective technologies—would have us obsess about past carnage. To be forward-facing requires you to think freely and independently, cherishing your individuality. Be powered by positive principles and imagination that are natively you and an expression of your own diversity. Walt Whitman captured it beautifully in advocating for “a way of life that encourages the full flowering of every individual’s unique personality, in a tapestry of infinite diversity.”

Caught up in humdrum routines, we may ignore the wonders of our existence. Perhaps they’re too close-up, like the Neo-Impressionist pointillism of a Seurat painting. Up close, we see a cacophony of disconnected dots. But take a step back, and the image emerges, with heightened luminosity and brilliance of color. So too is life. Often, we are simply too close up and see mostly flaws. But step back—disengage—and the wonder of it all emanates. As the Swiss modernist Ludwig Hohl puts it: “Some things can only be made clearer when one distances oneself drastically from them.”

Speaking of wonders, the amazing Andrea Bocelli is our honorary degree recipient this year. Post-pandemic, our world is in desperate need of healing—and so, too, is each one of us. And music is a remedy like no others. Music lifts the spirit, unifies, and unmasks our inner creative selves. At Jefferson, we have infused music throughout—noontime dean’s concerts, remarkable musical performers and acapella groups, live performances in the atria of our hospitals—all are part of our Medicine + Music archetype. The soaring voice of Andrea Bocelli is your send-off, Class of 2023, as you sail off to your lifelong calling to heal—not only bodies and souls, but also the collective body politic. Harness your wind—forward-facing—with optimism. As you embrace a world of post-pandemic opportunity, let this simple motto guide you: The Wind is Free.

Congratulations! Onwards and upwards!

Mark L. Tykocinski, MD
President, Thomas Jefferson University
Anthony F. and Gertrude M. DePalma Dean
Sidney Kimmel Medical College