Quotes – Steve Jobs

With the recent passing of Steve Jobs, the inspirational leader of design, I thought i’d share some of his best quotes.  Thankfully Swide.com did all of the hard work for me: http://www.swide.com/luxury-magazine/Faces/Artists/steve-jobs-quotes/2011/10/6

Starting with the best known quote:

On life -

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life … Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”  (Stanford Commencement, 2005)

On design -

“Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” (New York Times, 2003)

Life -

“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. Because 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.” (Stanford Commencement, 2005)

On Success -

“Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.”

On conformity -

“It’s more fun to be a pirate than to join the navy.” (1982)

On design -

“In most people’s vocabularies, design means veneer. It’s interior decorating. It’s the fabric of the curtains and the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a man-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.” (Fortune magazine 2000)

On focus -

“That’s been one of my mantras – focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: you have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.” (Business week 1998)

On Perseverance -

“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.” (Stanford Commencement, 2005)

On innovation and those that push it -

“Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes… the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules… You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things… they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do”

On Success -

“Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.”

On death -

“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.” (Stanford Commencement, 2005)

Steve Jobs – 1955-2011

Image from icanbecreative.com