Epilogue: Commencement.

Truth be told, I was not going to walk.

Due to circumstances, I had already decided that commencement was just an experience I would have to forfeit. I had convinced myself that it was what it was. That maybe this chapter would simply close without the ceremony, without the walk, without the formal ending.

C’est la vie, right?

But the truth is, some journeys deserve to be honored.

I defended my dissertation last summer, missing the graduation deadline by a little over a month. My degree was conferred in August. In every technical sense, it was over. I was done. I had completed the work. I had earned the degree. I had made it to the academy.

And in the nearly 100-year history of Indiana Institute of Technology, I became the youngest person to earn a PhD.

That sentence still feels surreal.

Not because of the recognition.

Not because of the title.

Not even because of the history made.

But because I know what it took to become the person standing on the other side of it.

Something in me knew this journey deserved a formal ending. Not for applause. Not for pictures. Not for the letters behind my name. But because there are some chapters you do not just finish quietly. There are some seasons you survive, grow through, and complete in a way that requires you to pause and acknowledge that you made it.

Commencement was not just about walking across a stage.

It was about honoring the weight of the journey.

After finishing, life hit harder than I expected.

There were moments when everything I had built felt like it was collapsing in real time. Moments when the finish line did not feel like celebration, but survival. Moments when I had to sit with grief, pressure, uncertainty, disappointment, and the quiet ache of becoming.

I had imagined that earning the degree would feel like arrival.

But in many ways, it became a mirror.

It showed me what I had carried.

It showed me what I had outgrown.

It showed me what still needed healing.

And piece by piece, I had to rebuild.

Eventually, I began to realize that what I thought was ruin was actually foundation. What felt like collapse was not the end of the story. It was the place where God began to reveal Himself as faithful, present, and worthy.

I have lost.

I have cried.

I have failed more times than I care to admit.

I have had to start over in places I never thought would break.

But somehow, in the middle of all of it, I have also grown.

I have impacted lives.

I have found clarity.

I have discovered strength I did not know I had.

I have begun to see just how much life still has to offer and how good it can get when you keep going long enough to meet the version of yourself waiting on the other side of the storm.

Today, the story feels complete.

And what a journey this has been.

A story filled with faith, failure, resilience, grief, growth, pressure, purpose, and perseverance. A story marked by moments when I wanted to quit, moments when I questioned everything, and moments when life forced me to rebuild from places I never imagined I would break.

But somehow, through every mountain and every valley, I kept going.

And maybe that is the lesson in all of this.

Sometimes God will let the pages get heavy just to show you that you were always strong enough to turn the page and keep writing.

Strong enough to survive the chapter.

Strong enough to grow through the pain.

Strong enough to finish the story.

Commencement was my epilogue.

Not the end of my life’s work.

Not the final word on who I am becoming.

But the sacred closing of a chapter that demanded everything from me and still could not defeat me.

“There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”

Anaïs Nin

Fin.

Signed,

Christopher A. Hinton, PhD, MBA