Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose – Steve Jobs

Possibly one of the harshest and most “back to reality” style motivational quote you would ever find. A reflection of Steve Job’s actual genius.

Steve said this quote in his 2005 commencement speech at Stanford University. Steve at the time was after his 2003-2004 cancer battle. This was before the iPhone launch in 2007.

“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.

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.

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 how 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 way for the new.”

It is true that our fear holds us back, our fear of failure, embarrassment holds us back. We do not launch our projects for fear of failure, we avoid learning new stuff for fear of embarrassment. Once you have no fear, you will be able to reach and unleash your full potential.

We get stuck in this rat race, in this monopoly game and in this made up society over-saturated with rules, it is a trap that hijack our potential and steals our time.

Facing death, Steve explains, that only what matters sticks. Whether that is family, legacy or even dreams.

This is maybe the most rough version of “just follow your dreams” that i have seen.

This quote will make you think and reflect about your life choices, for sure.

Let’s dissect the quote:

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.
What else can put things in perspective? Sometimes we fear taking big decisions because most people like the normality and the familiar. Taking big decisions will be stressful and can put us in conflict with our selves, thus we avoid, and we procrastinate.

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.
There is no greater fear humans have experienced, this fear is exponentially more powerful than anything else, and once this fear becomes something to consider nothing else can affect the individual. At that moment you think only about what is truly important to you.

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.
Following our dreams often require taking unpopular decisions, but remembering that our time is limited put this in perspective, as Sr. Francis Bacon puts it:
Begin doing what you want to do now. We are not living in eternity.

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 how 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 way for the new.
That’s how we evolve as a species, and that’s how our mentality evolve. What is incomprehensible for an old generation can be the normal for the new one. And that’s good, otherwise we would be still living with the rules and mindset of the middle ages.

R.I.P. Steve Jobs, my favorite entrepreneur, a man with a vision, a man of excellence, and the son of a Syrian immigrant.