I'm on a flight back to NYC from Missouri and I've been reflecting a lot about where I come from and where I made my adult life and feeling a lot of gratitude.  With graduation season upon us, I think back to when I graduated from high school in 1997, with a class of 15 students in a small farming community called King City, in the Northwest corner of Missouri.  I had a full ride in Chemical Engineering with an Air Force ROTC Scholarship to the University of Missouri and I thought my life was all mapped out.  What I never expected was basically an opposite career path that involved six declared majors, graduating with a Hospitality degree from the College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources and landing a job to be a banquet manager in New York City at the World Trade Center in May of 2001. And then a few short years later, I transitioned into the realm of insurance and have remained here for the past two decades.   

When I think about this journey, it reminds me of the quote by Henning Mankell: "You can have more than one home.  You can carry your roots with you, and decide where they grow."

Over the past week, as I was back in Missouri, there was a lot of news about Harrison Butker's commencement speech, which took place at a small Benedictine college about 30 minutes from where I grew up. Let's just say as a progressive career woman, there were a lot of parts for me that went over like a lead balloon.  I'm not into talking politics or religion, but it got me thinking about what I would say to graduates who are embarking on their next journey and reminiscing about some things that were said to me. So here goes…