Pronunciado en Stanford University en 2005

1. eJournal USA
A n
S p e c i a l
©AP Images / Palo Alto Daily News / Jack Arent
Stay hungry. Stay Foolish…
Stanford University Commencement Address, 2005
Steve Jobs • CEO • Apple Computer and Pixar Animation Studios
I
am honored to be with you today at your commence-
ment from one of the finest universities in the world. I never
graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve
ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three
stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.
The first story is about connecting the dots.
I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed
around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So
why did I drop out?
It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed
college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She
felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so every-

2. Steve Jobs at the 2007 MacWorld Conference & Expo in San Francisco. The background photo depicts Apple co-founders Steve
Wozniak and Jobs as young men. (©AP Images / Paul Sakuma)
thing was all set for me to be adopt- spent on my college tuition. After
ed at birth by a lawyer and his wife. six months, I couldn’t see the value
Except that when I popped out they in it. I had no idea what I wanted
decided at the last minute that they to do with my life and no idea how
really wanted a girl. So my parents, college was going to help me figure
who were on a waiting list, got a it out. And here I was spending all
call in the middle of the night ask- of the money my parents had saved
ing: “We have an unexpected baby their entire life. So I decided to drop
boy; do you want him?” They said: out and trust that it would all work
“Of course.” My biological mother out OK. It was pretty scary at the
later found out that my mother had time, but looking back it was one
never graduated from college and of the best decisions I ever made.
that my father had never graduated The minute I dropped out I could
from high school. She refused to stop taking the required classes
sign the final adoption papers. She that didn’t interest me, and be-
only relented a few months later gin dropping in on the ones that
when my parents promised that I looked interesting.
would someday go to college. It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t
And 17 years later I did go to col- have a dorm room, so I slept on the
lege. But I naively chose a college floor in friends’ rooms, I returned
that was almost as expensive as coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to
Stanford, and all of my working- buy food with, and I would walk the
class parents’ savings were being 7 miles across town every Sunday
—2—

3. night to get one good meal a week None of this had even a hope of
at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved any practical application in my life.
it. And much of what I stumbled into But ten years later, when we were
by following my curiosity and intu- designing the first Macintosh com-
ition turned out to be priceless later puter, it all came back to me. And
on. Let me give you one example: we designed it all into the Mac. It
Reed College at that time offered was the first computer with beau-
perhaps the best calligraphy instruc- tiful typography. If I had never
tion in the country. Throughout the dropped in on that single course
campus every poster, every label on in college, the Mac would have nev-
every drawer, was beautifully hand er had multiple typefaces or propor-
calligraphed. Because I had dropped tionally spaced fonts. And since
out and didn’t have to take the nor- Windows just copied the Mac, it’s
mal classes, I decided to take a cal- likely that no personal computer
ligraphy class to learn how to do would have them. If I had never
this. I learned about serif and san dropped out, I would have never
serif typefaces, about varying the dropped in on this calligraphy
amount of space between different class, and personal computers
letter combinations, about what might not have the wonderful typo-
makes great typography great. It graphy that they do. Of course it
was beautiful, historical, artistically was impossible to connect the dots
subtle in a way that science can’t looking forward when I was in col-
capture, and I found it fascinating. lege. But it was very, very clear look-
ing backwards ten years later.
Again, you can’t connect the dots
looking forward; you can only con-
nect 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, what-
ever. This approach has never let
me down, and it has made all the
difference in my life.
My second story is about love
and loss.
I was lucky—I found what I loved
to do early in life. Woz and I started
Apple in my parents garage when I
was 20. We worked hard, and in 10
years Apple had grown from just
the two of us in a garage into a $2
billion company with over 4000 em-
ployees. We had just released our
finest creation—the Macintosh—a
year earlier, and I had just turned
Steve Jobs with the first “Macintosh” personal computer after 30. And then I got fired. How can
a shareholder’s meeting in January, 1984. The Mac introduced
the mouse and a user-friendly graphic interface. (©AP Images you get fired from a company you
/ Paul Sakuma) started? Well, as Apple grew we
—3—

4. Disney’s Richard Cook and Steve Jobs at the Hollywood world premiere of Disney/Pixar’s “Monsters, Inc.,” in November 2001.
Jobs acquired Graphics Group from director George Lucas’ Lucasfilm in 1989, renamed it Pixar and created an award-winning
animation studio. “Toy Story” (1995) was the first of many successful animated films. Disney bought Pixar in 2006. (©AP Images
/ PRNewsFoto)
hired someone who I thought was did. The turn of events at Apple had
very talented to run the company not changed that one bit. I had been
with me, and for the first year or rejected, but I was still in love. And
so things went well. But then our so I decided to start over.
visions of the future began to di- I didn’t see it then, but it turned
verge and eventually we had a fall- out that getting fired from Apple
ing out. When we did, our Board of was the best thing that could have
Directors sided with him. So at 30 I ever happened to me. The heaviness
was out. And very publicly out. of being successful was replaced by
What had been the focus of my the lightness of being a beginner
entire adult life was gone, and it again, less sure about everything. It
was devastating. freed me to enter one of the most
I really didn’t know what to do creative periods of my life.
for a few months. I felt that I had let During the next five years, I
the previous generation of entrepre- started a company named NeXT,
neurs down—that I had dropped the another company named Pixar, and
baton as it was being passed to me. fell in love with an amazing woman
I met with David Packard and Bob who would become my wife. Pixar
Noyce and tried to apologize for went on to create the world’s first
screwing up so badly. I was a very computer-animated feature film, Toy
public failure, and I even thought Story, and is now the most success-
about running away from the val- ful animation studio in the world.
ley. But something slowly began to In a remarkable turn of events, Apple
dawn on me—I still loved what I bought NeXT, I returned to Apple,
—4—

5. and the technology we developed at like any great relationship, it just
NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s cur- gets better and better as the years
rent renaissance. And Laurene and roll on. So keep looking until you
I have a wonderful family together. find it. Don’t settle.
I’m pretty sure none of this My third story is about death.
would have happened if I hadn’t When I was 17, I read a quote
been fired from Apple. It was awful- that went something like: “If you
tasting medicine, but I guess the live each day as if it was your last,
patient needed it. Sometimes life someday you’ll most certainly be
hits you in the head with a brick. right.” It made an impression on
Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that me, and since then, for the past 33
the only thing that kept me going years, I have looked in the mirror
was that I loved what I did. You’ve every morning and asked myself:
got to find what you love. And that “If today were the last day of my
is as true for your work as it is for life, would I want to do what I am
your lovers. Your work is going to about to do today?” And whenever
fill a large part of your life, and the the answer has been “No” for too
only way to be truly satisfied is to many days in a row, I know I need
do what you believe is great work. to change something.
And the only way to do great work Remembering that I’ll be dead
is to love what you do. If you haven’t soon is the most important tool I’ve
found it yet, keep looking. Don’t set- ever encountered to help me make
tle. As with all matters of the heart, the big choices in life. Because al-
you’ll know when you find it. And, most everything—all external expec-
Steve Jobs shows off the NeXTstation, a product of NeXT Computer, Inc., a company Jobs founded after he was forced out of
Apple in 1985. (©AP Images / Eric Risberg)
—5—

6. tations, all pride, all fear of embar- say this to you with a bit more cer-
rassment or failure—these things tainty than when death was a use-
just fall away in the face of death, ful but purely intellectual concept:
leaving only what is truly impor- No one wants to die. Even peo-
tant. Remembering that you are ple who want to go to heaven don’t
going to die is the best way I know want to die to get there. And yet
to avoid the trap of thinking you death is the destination we all share.
have something to lose. You are No one has ever escaped it. And that
already naked. There is no reason is as it should be, because Death is
not to follow your heart. very likely the single best invention
About a year ago I was diag- of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It
nosed with cancer. I had a scan at clears out the old to make way for
7:30 in the morning, and it clearly the new. Right now the new is you,
showed a tumor on my pancreas. I but someday not too long from now,
didn’t even know what a pancreas you will gradually become the old
was. The doctors told me this was and be cleared away. Sorry to be so
almost certainly a type of cancer dramatic, but it is quite true.
that is incurable, and that I should Your time is limited, so don’t
expect to live no longer than three waste it living someone else’s life.
to six months. My doctor advised Don’t be trapped by dogma—which
me to go home and get my affairs is living with the results of other
in order, which is doctor’s code for people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise
prepare to die. It means to try to tell of others’ opinions drown out your
your kids everything you thought own inner voice. And most impor-
you’d have the next 10 years to tell tant, have the courage to follow
them in just a few months. It means your heart and intuition. They some-
to make sure everything is buttoned how already know what you truly
up so that it will be as easy as pos-
sible for your family. It means to
say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all
day. Later that evening I had a bi-
opsy, where they stuck an endo-
scope down my throat, through my
stomach and into my intestines, put
a needle into my pancreas and got a
few cells from the tumor. I was se-
dated, but my wife, who was there,
told me that when they viewed the
cells under a microscope the doc-
tors started crying because it turned
out to be a very rare form of pan-
creatic cancer that is curable with
surgery. I had the surgery and I’m
fine now.
This was the closest I’ve been
to facing death, and I hope it’s the Admirers the world over paid tribute to Steve Jobs after learn-
ing of his death on October 5, 2011. Here a man in Tokyo
closest I get for a few more decades. holds up an iPad that displays a commemorative candle. (©AP
Having lived through it, I can now Images / Hiro Komae)
—6—

7. want to become. Everything else its course, they put out a final issue.
is secondary. It was the mid-1970s, and I was
When I was young, there was your age. On the back cover of their
an amazing publication called The final issue was a photograph of an
Whole Earth Catalog, which was early morning country road, the
one of the bibles of my generation. kind you might find yourself hitch-
It was created by a fellow named hiking on if you were so adventur-
Stewart Brand not far from here in ous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay
Menlo Park, and he brought it to Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their
life with his poetic touch. This was farewell message as they signed off.
in the late 1960’s, before personal Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I
computers and desktop publishing, have always wished that for myself.
so it was all made with typewriters, And now, as you graduate to begin
scissors, and polaroid cameras. It anew, I wish that for you.
was sort of like Google in paper- Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
back form, 35 years before Google Thank you all very much.
came along: it was idealistic, and
overflowing with neat tools and This is a prepared text of the Commencement
great notions. address delivered by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple
Stewart and his team put out Computer and Pixar Animations Studios , on
several issues of The Whole Earth June 12, 2005. Courtesy of Stanford University
Catalog, and then when it had run News Service.
A woman uses her iPad to photograph the impromptu memorial created outside Steve Jobs’ Palo Alto home after the news of his
death spread. (©AP Images / Noah Berger)
—7—

8. ©AP Images / Shizuo Kambayashi
Steve Jobs
1955–2011
“Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished
that for myself. And now as you graduate to begin anew, I wish
that for you.”
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