Devotional8 Sep 2026In Appreciation of Friction: Embracing the Awkward
C. Shane ReesePresident of Brigham Young University
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Highlight Video Our highest desire is for each of you to succeed on your journeys back to our heavenly home. BYU is designed to aid you along that journey to become the person God wants you to become.Thank you, Wendy, for sharing that message on cultivating “ears to hear” the voice of the Lord.1 I know of no one who has developed ears to hear better than my beloved wife.BYU advancement vice president Keith Vorkink just said that you all look incredible. While that is absolutely true, I will tell you that there is also a vibe in this building that is undeniable! There is momentum on this campus, and I think that being together again today truly feels like a bit of a family reunion.If this is your first semester at BYU, welcome! We hope you feel at home. We want you to know that we love you. And now that you’re part of our BYU family, there are a few things it would be good for you to know.First, we have a pet. He’s a massive anthropomorphic cougar. His name is Cosmo. And for those of you with cat allergies, don’t worry; he’s a special breed that’s both hypoallergenic and hyperenergetic. This time of year he likes to hang out around the football stadium, so be on the lookout for his dancing and stunts. I think I saw a social media post that said, “Cosmo is insane!”This brings me to another important family tradition—we hold game nights. Lots of them. Come out and have an incredible time. But just a word of warning, these game nights cause spon-taneous acts of camaraderie and abundant feelings of school spirit. We also have some incredible family talent shows.At BYU’s second-century celebration in 1975, President Spencer W. Kimball prophesied that this campus would serve as the refining host to “brilliant stars” who would go out from BYU to illuminate the world with Christ’s light.2 You all are those brilliant stars with myriad gifts and talents. BYU has best-in-class musicians, choirs, dance teams, and so many talented artists and performing artists. Whatever your talents, do not hide them “under a bushel.”3 Hold them high like a Y on a mountain so others may see your light and glorify your Father in Heaven.On the subject of light, two of my favorite BYU family traditions each year are the joyous campus celebrations around Christmas and Easter, including the stunning Christmas tree lighting in Brigham Square—a tradition we only started last year.There are many other traditions you’ll simply discover and learn to love along the way. Others will just make you laugh. To quote the legendary film Tommy Boy, “We’re family. We’re gonna be doing lots of dumb stuff together.”4We’ll also be doing plenty of eternally meaningful things together.We will study together. We’ll teach, worship, pray, sing, and read the word of God together. We will “mourn with those that mourn . . . and comfort those that stand in need of comfort.”5 We’ll gather together each Tuesday for devo-tionals. We’ll seek to become united in Christ.Our highest desire is for each of you to succeed on your journey back to our heavenly home. BYU is designed to aid you along that journey to become the person God wants you to become.We just celebrated our 150th year as a university. This semester, then, is the first semester of the first year of BYU’s second half of its second century. And here you are, standing at the gate of this special moment in our history during the last dispensation of the fulness of times.This year the world will see the newly dedicated Salt Lake Temple. As it says in Isaiah:And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths.6We will have a special emphasis across campus on worship in the house of the Lord in anticipation of this historic moment in time.Draw closer to Jesus Christ through worship in His house. He will change you, and He will support you during even your most challenging moments. Make worship in the temple a priority, even amid the hustle and bustle of a new school year.Many of you might know that as a freshman, I wondered if I should pack up my things and go home. God sent help. But first I had to do something that was incredibly uncomfortable for me. I had to proactively speak to a faculty member. I’d never done that before. And frankly, it pushed me a bit beyond my comfort zone. It turned out to be crucial to helping me stay at BYU a bit longer, and I eventually found my place.I never dreamed at the time that one day I’d be standing here before all of you.Your path toward growth and service will be unique to you. But I promise that God wants you to become a new creature in Christ during your time here at BYU.Embrace the AwkwardSo at the beginning of this new semester, this second half of BYU’s second century, I want to share one piece of simple advice that was once given by a stake president to a young man preparing to preach the gospel and serve a mission.His advice: Embrace the awkward.When doors slam, when there are moments of silence or pregnant pauses or struggles with a foreign language, when you’re caught out in the rain, you must get comfortable with the uncomfortable. If you want to get along with that one companion—you all know the one—you have to learn to love a little quirkiness, or, as the case may be, a lot of quirkiness.New semesters at BYU mean new friends, new professors, new roommates, and maybe (just maybe) a new romance.All this newness invariably means plenty of awkward moments. And that’s great—fantastic even—because in my experience, awkwardness is a sign of growth.Think of the child who stands and falls; who takes a step and stumbles. We know that’s all part of the process. For anyone learning a language, clumsy or halted speech is a guaranteed prerequisite to eventual fluency.Perhaps you’ve heard of the word malapropism. It means to misuse a word in place of a word that sounds somewhat similar. Maybe you’ve heard a child say something such as “Hey, it’s not rocket surgery.”Those sorts of mix-ups suggest that a young mind is stretching, tinkering, and trying things out.Nobody masters anything by staying within the safety of what they already know. There must be productive struggle and frequent failure. So don’t be embarrassed by the stumbles. Champion them. They are badges of becoming.Even God’s perfect son, Jesus Christ—whose wisdom as a child caused the learned in the temple to marvel—still grew, as we read, “from grace to grace.”7 So be patient. That’s not abandoning the quest for excellence; it’s charting the road map for achieving it.In February, President Dallin H. Oaks called on us from this pulpit to
“strengthen our faith in [Jesus Christ],”“increase our humility,”“seek help from others,” andhave patience in the process.8I’m grateful for people too numerous to mention who have demonstrated patience with me as I continue to learn as a university president. In the office of the president, I deal with a dangerously high dosage of awkward moments. Call it an occupational hazard. Most of the awkwardness originates with the office’s current occupant.But I have learned to love those moments, because so often I have learned to love from them.And sometimes I have just learned to survive.If you’re ever hoisted into the air after a big football game win and suddenly find yourself awkwardly crowd-surfing, then you’ll understand.Or if you find yourself waving to people in a parade, as I did over the summer, and then you fall headlong into a pothole with hundreds of people looking on, I promise you that in the future you’ll probably pay more attention to the road than to the waving.The most awkward experience in my career, however, came during my time at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, where I was a researcher. Los Alamos was the site of the Manhattan Project, and today it remains a government research laboratory in which highly classified research takes place.During my time at Los Alamos, there was a research room in which nothing marked as classified could ever leave the room. When we finished our work in the room, we had to mark each paper with a classified stamp, and the item had to remain there in the room.No exceptions. No excuses. This was not a recommendation or a guideline; it was a hard-and-fast rule.After one particularly long session of analyzing data, my work buddy and I were finishing up and stamping our papers “classified” when, out of some mixture of work fatigue and a penchant for outrageous pranks, my buddy took the classified stamp and pounded it right across my T-shirt.Nothing marked classified could leave the room.A very awkward phone call and a very awkward request for a favor resulted in a hastily purchased T-shirt from the Los Alamos gift shop being delivered to the room.The other shirt remains the property of the U.S. government. Now please keep this story on the down-low, because even mentioning this classified T-shirt could get me in trouble.Embracing the awkward isn’t just about parades or office pranks; it matters because so much good in our lives comes from productive struggle and, yes, even a little friction.The Risks of FrictionlessnessElder Gerrit W. Gong recently spoke to faculty and staff and said that our new age of artificial intelligence will become one of the most significant influences on BYU’s campus in upcoming years. There are many exciting opportunities that AI offers, and Elder Gong charged us as a university community to ensure that we aid you students in being prepared for this new season. He said students of faith and character with refined intellectual habits and work ethic will always remain in demand during any age.9One area of concern in this new age of AI, however, is what social commentators have identified as our increasingly “frictionless” lives. Let me read you an opinion article published in 1996 in the Los Angeles Times:Imagine that it’s 2025. The world is thoroughly wired with a vast, high-capacity telecommunications network, and just about every home in America has a digital “telecosm” device. [I don’t know what a “telecosm” device is, but I think he means a smart TV.] You want to watch your favorite sitcom. You don’t have to wait until it comes up in a weekly schedule, and you won’t have to get it from a TV company or even a TV network. Instead, you’ll tap into a digital feed from the sitcom producers themselves.Say you want to buy a new refrigerator. Instead of driving to nearby stores and looking at the various models and prices or scouring newspaper ads for sales, you’ll just whip up a special little software program and send it off to scour the global Net for refrigerators that match your needs and price range. When it finds sources that match your requirements, it’ll let you know where they are.10Now mind you, that was written 30 years ago!The author, along with many others at the time, referred to a future such as this as a frictionless economy. And guess what, we’re all living in it right now. But now this unrelenting push toward more convenience and less friction has entered even the academy as we read about creating “frictionless student experiences—no clunky apps or separate logins.”11This is understandable, for who doesn’t want a streamlined, seamless experience?But one writer in the Atlantic magazine wondered:By delegating effort, do we lose the traits that help us navigate the unknown—or even [the traits that help us] to think for ourselves? . . .In recent years, society has been conditioned to see friction not as a teacher but as a flaw—something to be optimized away in the name of efficiency. But friction is where discernment lives. It’s where thinking starts.12Let me repeat that: “Friction is where discernment lives. It’s where thinking starts.”To be clear, much good can come from the noble quest of alleviating pain points, whether in medicine or in the daily necessities of life. And Christ calls on us to alleviate suffering and to aid those in need. But as disciples and as a campus, we need to be mindful of President Oaks’s warning to not let our strengths become our weaknesses.13We can’t let technology’s endless march toward a frictionless society lead to what experts call “cognitive offloading”14 or moral atrophy by allowing algorithms to do the thinking for us.So what actions can you take today? Let me suggest two:First, remove your earbuds on campus.Second, bury your phone deep in your backpack.Too often, earbuds and cell phones become ways to avoid those awkward human inter-actions that social scientists remind us are actually so important for our development—and, I would add, are also critical to our ability to serve God’s children.The easy move in almost every social setting is to scroll on our phones or listen to a podcast. The harder but better move—the move in which the magic comes—is when you open your mouth and talk to the person sitting alone just one table over or when you strike up small talk while you’re standing in the long line at the new Costa Vida. How about that Costa Vida, by the way?Last week I received the following letter from alums Mike and Carol. When Mike first came to BYU, he was not a member of the Church. Mike was here on a basketball scholarship. While standing in the add/drop line (ask your faculty about that thing from the olden days), Carol had the gumption to ask Mike what stake he was from. Mike described himself as a lapsed Catholic at the time, so he had no idea what a stake was, other than a great source of protein.Mike told her that he had no idea what she was talking about, but they had a pleasant enough conversation.Two days later they recognized each other outside Helaman Halls. They eventually went on a date. Thanks in part to Carol’s fellowship, Mike joined the Church within months after coming to BYU. He played basketball for two years, served a mission, and eventually married Carol—the very first coed who had spoken to him that first day on BYU’s campus. Now, five children, 17 grandchildren, and two more missions later, Carol and Mike cherish their time at BYU and say their experiences weren’t “by accident but rather by divine design.”What if Carol hadn’t talked to Mike, or what if Mike had had earbuds in while standing in the add/drop line?Last year, Brother Sean R. Dixon, a counselor in the Young Men general presidency, recounted his own experience of finding love while waiting for a parking pass at BYU.Fresh home from his mission and standing in line, he began asking the young lady in front of him about how things worked on campus. What could have been a long 30-minute wait turned into an energizing conversation.Brother Dixon then explained:I tried to work up the courage to get her number with the hope that we could connect later. Unfortunately I never got the words out. We got to the head of the line. She paid for her parking pass and said goodbye. I paid for my pass and hurried out the door, hoping to see her. There she was, lingering over by her car. . . .. . . I leaned down to tie my shoes, mustering my final burst of courage. When I looked up, she was getting in her car, and then she drove away.15Regretting what seemed like a missed opportunity, he later sulked to his mother. She told him to go find the coed’s number in the campus directory. Brother Dixon mustered even more courage to call his future wife, Michelle, and that bit of courage to not shy away from the awkward truly transformed his life.16Now no one has ever told me that swiping on TikTok while waiting in line transformed their life!So embrace the awkward. Embrace the human. Say something to one of God’s children. Find some friction. Who knows, it might even generate some honor code–appropriate sparks!I know I just said something awkward—and that’s the point!Something else that can feel uncomfortable or awkward are BYU’s dress and grooming standards. But these too will bless your lives as you live them. You’ll stand out from the world in ways that will draw others to you, including employers. These standards allow our community to unite in our common aspirations of seeking “learning, even by study and also by faith.”17Now the same wise stake president who had told me to embrace the awkward also challenged our stake to wave to one another while we were driving around town. It’s something I have now done for decades.Sometimes it felt very awkward, and there were many days when no one waved back. But now I realize that doing this for decades helped change me and prepared me for my current service. If you will do the same—wave, smile, and engage with one another as you walk around campus this semester—I promise it will prepare you for your future roles serving in your homes, your professions, the Church, and your communities.Having a machine lift weights for you won’t build your muscles. Having artificial intelligence write and think for you won’t develop your intellect, character, or social skills. Taking up your cross often requires first putting down your phone!Turn to Jesus ChristAs in all things, Jesus Christ is our example. We need to find ways to turn from our screens and look to Jesus and live. Christ could not have ministered to the woman taken in adultery had He avoided the uncomfortable conversation.18 The Savior would never have seen Zacchaeus up in a tree had He been staring down at a literal scroll.19The Savior was so often focused on others. His gaze was upward and outward, not inward and downward. He saw people deeply. He spoke to them individually. He sat with the woman at the well.20 He broke bread and washed the feet of His disciples.21 He noticed those who were on the periphery. He blessed the children and the sick and afflicted when He visited the Nephites.22 He sensed when a woman merely touched the hem of His garment.23Such profound individual ministering is rarely convenient by the world’s standards. But if such moments are important enough for God’s Only Begotten Son, then they should be important for each of us—especially on this, the Lord’s campus, during the second half of BYU’s second century.So I beg you to sit a little bit longer with a friend in need. Give a few more smiles. Struggle a little harder together on that group project that’s already due two weeks into the semester. Start a conversation with someone you don’t know at the Cougareat.Listen to God more and your earbuds less.Jesus Christ died so that we could live more abundantly.24 So let us live as He would have us live, this semester and always. I promise you that your futures are so bright. Brighter than even you know. Embrace those futures, including the awkward and the uncomfortable. Christ’s Atonement will consecrate it all for your good. Your wrongs can be wiped clean, and all the injustices of this life can be made right through Him. I testify they will be.Our dear friends and our dear family, we love you and we pray the Lord’s choicest blessings upon you as you begin this new semester. In the sacred name of Jesus Christ, amen.
© Brigham Young University. All rights reserved.C. Shane Reese, president of Brigham Young University, delivered this devotional address on September 8, 2026.Related Topics
Artificial Intelligence
BYU
Courage
Loneliness
Ministering
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