- When I was 17, i read quote that went something like: "if you life each your day as if it was your last, someday you will most certainly be right". it made impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, i have looked in the mirror every morning and ask 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 to not follow your heart.
- 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 don't want to die to get there, and yet death is the destination we all share, no one has ever escape it, and that it as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life, it's life's change agent. It clears out the old to make what 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's 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 result 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. There somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
- You can only connecting the dots looking backward, not looking forward
- Believing that the dots will connect down the road will give you the confidence to follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well worn path, and that will make all the difference
by Steve Jobs at Stanford Speech 2005 Source