After sharing her story about leaving ER, Margulies offered this nuanced take on courage. She wasn't advocating recklessness — her own bold decision to walk away from $27 million had been informed by deep self-knowledge, family counsel, and years of understanding what truly fulfilled her. The distinction between fearlessness and 'thoughtful, mindful fearlessness' reflected her Sarah Lawrence education. She told graduates to measure every new opportunity against the goals they had set for themselves, noting that 'the distance between the opportunity you have and the goals you've set is the same distance between true fulfillment and settling.' Margulies paired this with urgency: 'Now is the time in your life to be selfish. To explore. To take chances. The time in your life when you don't have obligations — like family, bosses and bills — to the time that you do, goes by in the blink of an eye. Use it wisely.' The message was clear: be bold, but let your boldness be guided by self-awareness rather than impulse.