Stanford Commencement speech STEVE JOBS

  I am respected to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. 

That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories universities in the world. I never graduated from college.

 Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to college s. I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I quit.

 So why did I drop out? It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption.

 She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by a college graduate, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they wanted a girl. 

So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers.

 She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college. And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. 

After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. 

So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

 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. Let me give you one example: Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. 

Throughout the campus, every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully handed Calligraphy raped. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this.

 I learned about serif and sans serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great.

 It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture and found fascinating. None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. 

But 10 years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. 

If I had never dropped in on that single college course, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, no personal computer would likely have them. 

If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do.

 Of course, it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ⅝10 years later. 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.

 My second story is about love and loss. I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents’ garage when I was 20.

 We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4,000employees. We had just released our finest creation — macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30.

 And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well.

 But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30, I was out. 

And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating. I didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down — that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me.

 I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. 

The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over. I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.

 The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life. 

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife.

 Pixar went on to create the world’s first computer-animated feature film, Toy Sto, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought Next, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’scurrent renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together. 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. 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. 

My third story is about death. When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?”

 And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something. 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. About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumour on my pancreas.

 I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is the doctor’s code for prepare to die. 

It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes. I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach, and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas, and got a few cells from the tumor. 

I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now. 

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept: No one wants to die.

 Even people who want to go to heaven do 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 inner voice. And most important, dare to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

 When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation.

 It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch.

 This was in the late 1960s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and Polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form,35 years before Google came along: It was idealistic and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

 Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age.

 On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it was the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. 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. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. Thank you all very much. 

Women's Empowerment speech PREITY ZINTA

  Preity: Hi, good morning, everyone. It's wonderful to be here. Thank you, Jackie. And we should get on with it. Interviewer: Yeah. We're just going to have a pretty casual conversation about her work and a little bit about what her impact has been. So, I'll go right into my first question. 

You're a celebrated Bollywood actress and you're also the owner of a cricket team. So, tell me what that transition has been like going from actress to businesswoman because they're kind of two separate things.

 Tell me what that journey was like for you. Preity: Well, it wasn't the easiest journey, to be honest. Because you see for a woman, cricket is a very macho sport. It's a man's world out there. It was easier to fit in the world of cinema as opposed to fitting in the world of sports. 

But I think I'd like to rewind and go when I was a little girl, my father, he always told me that Indian girls, when they're little they're dependent on their fathers when they are married, they're dependent on their husbands. And when they are older, they're dependent on their sons. So, I do not want you to be like that.

 I want you to be independent. I want you to have a mind of your own. And the only way you can do that is if you are financially independent, you can work. So, I always had that mindset that I wanted to work.

 And it didn't matter if, whatever your field is. Like I studied Criminal Psychology and I became an actor. So, life is very spontaneous. It's not like you make plans and you say, okay, I want to do this, but you end up doing something else. 

So, I didn't think when I was acting, I would ever get into the world of sport. But one day I found an opportunity and I decided I wanted to do it. It was not the easiest, but it was a lot of fun. I worked 18 hour days. And eventually when I look back and think if it isn't tough, if there isn't a challenge for you in life, then it's not that exciting.

 You know, when things just fall easily into your lap, I guess you don't appreciate them. So, it's been a bit of an uphill journey, but it's been a fun journey. Interviewer: Well, since you mentioned spontaneity, I want us to rewind and I'd like you to just briefly tell us how you got into acting because I think that was a cool story. Preity: Okay.

 So, I was studying Criminal Psychology and my best friend's boyfriend went to audition for a movie. We were both very poor at that time, so we decided we share a cab. Whoever finishes first would pick the other person up. So, my exam got over. 

I took my paper and I finished. So, I went to pick him up and there was a major audition happening out there. I of course was always hungry at that time. So, since I didn't know what to do, I went to the corner and I started eating and I saw the director out there and he just looked at me and he was like, so what are you going to do for me today? And I was like, nothing.

 And he was like, all right. I said, no, I'm sorry. I haven't come here to audition. I've just come here to pick up my friend. And so, basically, he just grabbed my hand and took the mic. And he said, everyone, this is a classic case of cold feet. This is what should never happen to you. And he just put me on the spot and asked me to audition. And I was like, I don't know how to audition. 

And he was like, just do whatever you want to do. So, I just mumbled and jumbled, and I don't even know what I did. But two weeks later he asked me to do the movie and I was on my way to Munich.

 And I thought, instead of me sharing a room with someone, if I do this film, I can have my room when I study further. So, it was as simple as that, I just signed on to that film.

 And I became an actor and the film never happened, but he did this big interview as to how I would be this big star and other people came to sign me on. And I just learned everything on set and I was extremely lucky.

 I worked with good directors. My first film did very well. My second film did exceptionally well. So, I just became an actor by accident.

 Interviewer: And once you went on to become an actor, you've been kind of praise for it, changing the expectations of what a Hindi heroin can be in the film. Can you tell us a little bit about how that process was for you and just, yeah, just give us some tips and inspiration on how that process was for you? Changing expectations of what women are like on film. 

Preity: Well, I think, I don't think I would try to intellectualize anything and I thought about it so seriously. I was just doing things that suited me. I was never the hot chick. I was never the sex symbol. I was very tomboyish. And so, for me, I found it difficult to be the damsel in distress all the time.

 I would rather be the person who fought the distress, right? So, instead of focusing on roles that, well I never really got those really pretty, pretty roles anyway.

 But I wanted to do roles that were more women of substance that, you know, no human being is one dimensional, no woman is one dimensional, but it's very easy to cast a woman as the object of desire or somebody who's like help me, please. And Indian Cinema went through this whole the 50s, the 60s were very rich for roles for women.

 But then the 70s and the 80s became completely male-centred where the hero was saving the woman. And she was always, you know, she didn't have a brain to think for herself.

 She was always being rescued. So, it just started very simply as me not wanting to be rescued, A. And I also wanted to do roles that showed what was happening in society at that point. And my first film was about teenage pregnancy and an unwed mother.

 And we are a country of now I think 1.25, or I don't know, billion people, and yet it was difficult for us to discuss sex. So, that film was a way of going out there and saying, okay, you know, there are so many issues, it was an issue-based film. 

So, there are so many things that you want to talk about and you can do it through a film medium as opposed to just being the glamorous woman out there. So, it started le. And then I was really lucky. I got some really good roles and of course,  I had to work hard at them, but I was also lucky that I never really got the, just stand there and look the pretty role. So, I was lucky. 

Interviewer: That's awesome. And do you also feel like, because you were given those roles and because for the past couple of years, you know, you've been pretty vocal about like violence against women and gender biases? Can you tell me a little bit about what it was that kind of like gave you that voice and allowed you to be so vocal about issues like that, which are often shied away from? Preity: Well, I don't think it's particularly me. 

But I think in general, if you try to go out of the prescribed role for you in life, people usually question it. Of course, in countries that are not very developed, a woman is typically looked at as a homemaker.

 It's very different for people to look at you and say, okay, you can also do a job. I mean, it's different of course, in America, in different other countries. But there are lots of other countries that are not so developed. 

And for them, it's easier to look at a woman and say, okay, you know, she is in the home, she should be married, she should have kids. And that's her role in life. Anything beyond that, when you try to step out, you get questioned. For example, me being in cricket, it doesn't matter if I work 18 hour days. It doesn't matter if I've been in the business for like 9 or 10 years. 

I still, when I go out there, It of questions I have to deal with are, oh, your hair looks a nice dress. What about your makeup? So, sometimes it's a little exasperating, because you're like, after all these years, you still want to ask me those questions. And it's not me in particular, I think every woman goes through that. But it's changing.

 And you know, I was the first woman in cricket in India, and now there are so many more women being involved. And I feel great about that. I also think that you always have to do what you want to do.

 You should not limit, you should not put boundaries around you and say, hey, this is not the role I want to do. It's like because it doesn't suit me. 

It's okay to be a square in a hole or, you know, whatever the terminology is, sorry. Interviewer:  Square in a round hole. Preity: In a round hole or whatever it is, sorry. But it's okay. It's okay. 

As long as you can follow your heart, it's okay. You know, it's okay if people criticize you as long as you know what you want to do. And people come, come around eventually. It might not be the easiest thing to do in the beginning, but people do come around.

 Interviewer: And you've also been pretty vocal about human trafficking, specifically amongst girls. What do you believe if anything, there could be done to improve that and to bring awareness to that and help that issue? Preity: Well, you know, I would like to rewind and go to a time when, very early in my life, I saw my maid.

 I had this maid who was nd awesome. But she used to be the one who used to work. And her husband was an alcoholic and he wouldn't work. But every time she got her pay, he would come and beat her and take the money so that he could go drink. 

And we tried to go to the cops and we tried to help her out. And the first thing everybody told us is,  hey, don't get involved. It's none of your business. It's something personal between them, don't get involved.

 So, that was something that kind of shook me up to where I felt none of us gets involved, unless it directly involves us, you know unless something happens to us.

 And then we feel zed and we feel why isn't anybody else trying to get involved. So, I think when I got famous, I felt I had a voice and it was important to use this voice and to be involved. 

And I was, I saw some kids and I saw some people who were rescued from human trafficking and it broke my heart because usually, you think, okay, you know, they were like 8-year-old girls, 10-year-old boys, and they didn't have a voice. Nobody cared. Nobody really, it never mattered to them to see what's going to happen.

 So, it started with that. And I think it doesn't matter if you can, it matters if you can make a difference to one person, you know, as long as you can make a difference. 

So, it started with that. And you know, after that, it was just there. Interviewer: And what would be your last message that you would want to give to our audience and young girls around the world about empowerment and self-worth? Preity: Well, I think my message to all the girls out there is there was this quote I read once and I loved it. It says, 'Don't tell me the sky is the limit when you have footprints on the moon.' So, I don't think women and girls should limit themselves to anything.

 I think they should be brave enough to follow their dreams. It's okay to make mistakes. It's okay to fall. What's important is not how hard you fall, but how you get up after you fall. So, go out there, follow your dreams, unless you go and give it a shot you'll never know where you land up. 

And I think once you decide you want to follow a certain path, even though there might be problems in the beginning and people might say, no, this is not the right thing for you to do.

 But if they see you're determined, they will support you. And I think that's it. You just go follow your dreams and be who you want to be. Especially now, it's 2016, you know.

 Interviewer: Now of all times is a perfect time. Preity: Yes. Interviewer: Yeah, I agree. And one last thing that I would like to ask you is aside from being an actress, a celebrated actress, and a cricket team owner, what else do you see yourself doing in the future? Preity: Oh, there are so many things I want to do. 

I always say, 'Too many things, too little time.' But what I wanted to do when I was a little kid and what I studied for was I wanted to be a detective and a forensic scientist. So, I don't know if I can do that. But I think I do also want to, besides all the various ambitions I have, I also want to be a mother. 

I want to have a family. And that's a very important part of my life too. But there's no set rule that this is what I want to do. Whatever inspires me, because if I look back into my life, whenever I made a plan, it never really worked out because life is spontaneous. Because I was studying to be something else,  I became an actor. 

And then from acting, I jumped to cricket. So, I don't know what's going, I mean, I do know I want to have a family. But besides that, I don't know what's going to inspire me or what's going to suddenly affect me and where it'll take me, as long as I think you just are. As I said, you follow your heart, you're in a good place.