Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.?
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.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything—all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure—these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
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.
I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. 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 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.
It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on.
求知若渴,大智若愚。這是我一直想做到的。眼下正值諸位大學(xué)畢業(yè)、開始新生活之際,我同樣愿大家:Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.?好學(xué)若饑、謙卑若愚。
你們的時間都有限,所以不要按照別人的意愿去活,這是浪費時間。不要囿于成見,那是在按照別人設(shè)想的結(jié)果而活。不要讓別人觀點的聒噪聲淹沒自己的心聲。最主要的是,要有跟著自己感覺和直覺走的勇氣。無論如何,感覺和直覺早就知道你到底想成為什么樣的人,其他都是次要的。
讓我能夠做出人生重大抉擇的最主要辦法是,記住生命隨時都有可能結(jié)束。因為幾乎所有的東西——所有對自身之外的希求、所有的尊嚴(yán)、所有對困窘和失敗的恐懼——在死亡來臨時都將不復(fù)存在,只剩下真正重要的東西。記住自己隨時都會死去,這是我所知道的防止患得患失的最好方法。你已經(jīng)一無所有了,還有什么理由不跟著自己的感覺走呢。