Steve Jobs - Gone at 56

Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, passed away today at 56.  Too young to die.  But he seemed to pack numerous lifetimes of achievement into one.  He recently gave a commencement speech which included several pearls of wisdom:

During the speech, he touched on the fact he was adopted, along with the fact that he did not graduate from college, although he took a variety of classes, including calligraphy, which later pointed him toward creating the typography for the Macintosh computer.  As he reflected on his past choices, he referred to these as connecting the dots through his life.  Jobs said, "Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life." 

I've had a lot of dots in my life that didn't make sense for my future until I look at them in retrospect. 

Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going (after being fired from Apple) was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

That's a big lesson - don't settle.  I've settled in my past but I'm determined not to make that mistake in my future. 

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition - wow!  Those are powerful words!  I may just have to post this on my bathroom wall as a reminder every day.  I do know that the times I've ignored my intuition are the times that found me in trouble. 

Rest in peace, Steve Jobs.

You can find the full text of Steve's commencement speech here.