SIX STRINGS

Earlier this summer in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, country music singer Eric Church delivered the best commencement speech I have heard in years. Yet it wasn't what he said that caught my attention. It was how he said it. How he delivered his message. How he told his story.

Church, with his guitar tethered to his shoulder, talked to the graduating Tar Heels about the “Six Strings of Life” that would shape their years ahead — Faith, Family, Marriage/Partnership, Adversity/Resilience, Community, and Individuality.

In his words,

“Six Strings — when all six are in tune, the chords they make can stop a conversation cold, carry a broken person through the worst night of their life, or make a room full of strangers feel for three minutes like they have known each other forever. But, if even one is off, the whole chord unravels. Not gradually. Not politely. The moment you strike it, you know.”

Church then strummed his guitar, striking an out-of-tune string that created a jarring sound that echoed all the way from Kenan Stadium down to Franklin Street.

He then unpacked each string’s meaning. Each lesson was better than the last. Since I can’t do the speech justice in a short Substack, I highly recommend watching it in its entirety. It’s eighteen minutes you won’t regret (link).

That said, here is my attempt to pick out the highlights:

Low E — Your Faith

“Low E is your thickest string. Your foundational string. Your faith. Tending to it during ‘ordinary’ seasons is what enables you to not come undone during ‘extraordinary’ ones. The world will try to untune this string. Don’t let it. Tend to your faith.”

A String — Your Family

“The A string gives a chord its warmth. It is not a holiday string. It’s an everyday string. Protect it. It’s the people who have loved you longer than you’ve been easy to love. Call your people. Not when there is news. Not when there is nothing. Show up when it costs you something.”

D String — Your Spouse/Partner

“The D string sits in the middle of the guitar, giving the chord its body and its soul. That is exactly what the right spouse or partner will do for your life. They will either amplify every other string or slowly pull the whole instrument into an out-of-tune mess. Choose them wisely, then love them fiercely.”

G String – Your Ambition and Resilience

“I didn’t name the damn thing (while laughing). It is just what it is. The G string drifts faster than the others because ambition and resilience both live on this string, constantly pulling in opposite directions. The world breaks everyone and when it does, get back up. Tune the string. Keep playing.”

The B String – Your Community

“The B string is your community and is at risk because your generation faces a temptation none have before. The temptation to perform for everyone and belong to no one. To be globally visible and locally invisible. To have thousands of followers, yet no one knows where you live. Resist this. Learn people’s actual names, not their usernames.”

The High E String – Your Independence

“The E string is the highest note and carries the melody. It is also bent most easily by outside pressure. Social media is going to show you a thousand versions of a life that looks better than yours. It will be relentless and curated, and will try to convince you to retune yourself to match what they think you should sound like. Do not let them touch your string.”

Listening to Church, I realized I wasn't simply listening to a commencement speech. I was watching a masterclass in communication. His advice wasn't new. Graduates have heard similar messages for generations. What made this speech memorable wasn't the message. It was the metaphor. And that distinction explains why some ideas change people, while others disappear almost as quickly as they're spoken.

The reality is that good storytelling doesn't make weak ideas stronger. It makes strong ideas memorable. In some cases, unforgettable.

A great story gives people something they can carry with them long after they have forgotten the words. Months from now, most UNC graduates probably won't remember every sentence Eric Church spoke. But they will undoubtedly remember his six strings.

This extends far beyond a graduation speech. It is everywhere.

It is how Coca-Cola became more than a soft drink and Apple became more than a computer company.

It’s how John F. Kennedy convinced Americans we could put a man on the moon and how Ronald Reagan instilled the confidence needed to win the Cold War.

More recently, it's how Elon Musk convinced investors to believe in a vision long before his companies fully delivered on it.

That said, storytelling only gets you so far.

If Coca-Cola didn’t taste good, no amount of “Mean Joe Greene” advertising could have turned it into one of the world’s most successful brands.

If Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong hadn’t landed on the moon, JFK’s legacy would have been tarnished.

And if Elon Musk hadn't made reusable rockets commercially viable, transformed the electric vehicle market, or expanded internet access through satellite technology, he likely would have been dismissed as a charlatan.

Knowing this, how would I describe the relationship between storytelling and substance?

In short, storytelling gives substance a chance to be heard.

The reality is that the world is full of talented people, innovative companies, and groundbreaking ideas. Yet many never gain traction. Not because they lack substance, but rather because they fail to connect. Storytelling opens the door. Execution is what keeps it open. The people and organizations that ultimately succeed are the ones that tell a compelling story, then spend years proving it to be true.

Church could have stood at the podium in Chapel Hill and simply told the graduating Tar Heels to nurture their faith, call their parents, choose their spouse wisely, persevere through hardship, invest in their communities, and remain true to themselves. The advice would have been worthwhile, but without the story and his guitar, it wouldn't have struck a chord (no pun intended). It wouldn't have resonated. And it certainly wouldn't have gone viral.

Church understood this. Not just the power of a story, but also the reality that these graduates were about to begin writing their own. A story that would not be easy to tell, and even harder to live out.

“Six strings. Six strings of life and willingness to keep them in tune. Six principles. Six pillars. When all six are in tune with each other, the chord your life makes is full and resonant and true. All six will drift, not one or two. All six. In their own time in their own season. Your faith will go quiet when you need it loud. Your family gets complicated in a way only the people who love you most can complicate things. You will go through hard seasons with your spouse. Your ambition will hollow out and your resilience will wear thin. Your community will feel like an obligation and your world will try to sand down the edges of exactly who you are. This is not failure. This is not weakness. It is the inevitable universal experience of living in an imperfect world that doesn’t stop to let us tune up. And the difference between a life that sounds like music and a life that sounds like noise is whether you stop and listen. Whether you are honest enough to hear which string has drifted out of tune and humble enough to make the adjustment instead of just turning up the volume and hoping no one notices, because you will notice. Life won’t be right until it is tuned. Trust what your heart hears and is telling you about your song. So, graduates, now I encourage you to take your six strings, make it something worth hearing, and play your song as I leave you with mine.”

And then, after eighteen minutes of telling graduates how to play the song of their lives, Church did the only thing that made sense. He picked up his guitar and closed graduation by singing “Carolina” to every graduating Tar Heel.

Now comes the hard part — turning their stories into reality.