Today, when I heard the news that Steve Jobs had died, my first reaction was disbelief. The news came from a classmate, reading from his Twitter feed. Within a couple of minutes, we knew it was true. I felt an immediate void within, as if a part of me was missing. I didn’t understand this feeling, because while I was a user of Apple products, I was never a lover of them to the extent of others I have known. I now realize that this void was not a sense of loss for the visionary behind the Apple products that adorned my wrist, filled my pocket, and rested on my bedstand. No, what I was feeling was the loss of a kindred spirit, an icon for all of those who love technology and the hope for a better future. In the last ten years of my life, the world has fundamentally changed in how people communicate with each other, how relationships are conceived and nurtured, and how we interact with technology. Steve Jobs was a central figure that drove technology forward, a passionate and polarizing man who created change through sheer force of personality and vision.
What I lost when Steve Jobs passed was the knowledge that somewhere, he was cooking up something great that would once again shift my world. When he lived, we knew that technology would evolve and improve. That was the only possible outcome for a world with Steve Jobs in it. He wasn’t always right, but his relentless drive and his refusal to compromise his vision allowed him to rise from failure. He defied expectations and then surpassed them beyond anyone’s wildest imagination. There are few people who have accomplished as much as he did in my era, and I admire the hell out of him. Today, I mourn him. Tomorrow, I will learn from his example.
To honor his memory, I watched his commencement speech at Stanford, given in 2005. In that speech he talked about his belief that what he did today would be important in the future. We all should believe this. It gives meaning to those things we do today, connects our past to our present, and provides hope that who we are and what we’ve done will make for a better tomorrow. He also talked about how he found what he loved early in life, and how that led him down the path to success and happiness. He begged the audience to never stop looking for what they loved. This is something I myself embraced over a year ago when I turned my back on a great career and chose to find opportunities in the technology industry. We should never be satisfied until we’ve found what we love, because that discovery will enable us to sustain ourselves despite whatever challenges may appear. Finally, Steve talked about his first experience with death and how it affected him. He talked about how death is a great catalyst for change and a motivational tool he used to make sure he met his own expectations. He lived life knowing that one day he would die, and used his finite opportunities to decide how to spend his time. Many of us live in the now and don’t dwell on the lost seconds, minutes, years. If we were to die today, would we be happy with what we’ve done? With what we’re doing? The answer to these questions are important, and I tried to come up with my own answers tonight. When was the last time you asked yourself these questions?
