Steve Jobs, one of the key figures behind tech giant Apple’s success, is next up on our list of the best motivational speeches of all time.
In his 2005 Stanford commencement speech the former Apple CEO dives deep into his own journey as an entrepreneur, and he speaks openly about the issues that he’s faced along the way, and how he overcame them.
During this classic motivational speech Jobs talks about how he was actually a college dropout, and that this was one of the most important times of his life.
Why?
He mentioned that he dropped out of college to take classes which he was truly interested in, rather than studying topics which he wasn’t deeply passionate about.
One of those classes that he took up after dropping out was calligraphy. He was so compelled by the high standard of handwriting.
To many, this might seem like a strange choice, but he connects his experience that he gained from that class to the font choices that he installed in Apple computers.
If Jobs had never taken that calligraphy class, he wouldn’t have cared so much about a seemingly small detail, like fonts, but Apple was the first company to add different typefaces to their operating systems.
He goes on to say: “You can’t connect the dots if you’re looking forward, you can only do it looking backwards. So, you need to keep moving forward and hope that the dots align somehow.”
The key message from this famous motivational speech is that we’re always learning. We’re always growing and finding out new information. It’s all about what we choose to do with that information which really defines us.
As Jobs said: “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.”
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.” This line is my inspiration! We have to find the inner us and live it fully.