Saturday, December 26, 2009

Limited and Precious

Below is a short excerpt from a speech given by Steve Jobs to Stanford graduates after his cancer diagnosis and how the prospect of death had ceased to be just a useful intellectual concept (as quoted in Inside Steve's Brain, by Leander Kahney):
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 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 importantly, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
Continually clearing out the old and false from heart and mind to make way for the new and true.

Happy New Year!

4 comments:

tshsmom said...

WOW! That kinda ties together what we've been thinking, doesn't it?

Cherie said...

Yes, Tshs, yes it is. I thought of you - and me, of course - when I first read this.

Ben said...

And in case you haven't seen it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1R-jKKp3NA

Full video.

I think he has the right perspective!

Cherie said...

"Stay hungry. Stay foolish." I remember the Whole Earth Catalog.

Thanks for sending the link. I wanted to hear the whole speech and am so glad I now have. I agree with you, I think Stevie boy has it right.