商业精英

I would like to share 5 lessons what did I learn at the kitchen table: First, do your best; Second, find your purpose; Third, listen to understand; Fourth, be honest always; And fifth, include one more. I’ve learned, time and again, how fundamental these lessons have been and continue to be.

As you go forward today, use your minds and hands and your hearts to build something bigger than yourselves. Always remember, there is no idea bigger than this. As Dr. Martin Luther King said, “All life is interrelated. We are all bound together into a single garment of destiny.”

I believe we are finally creating the scientific and technological tools to turn the world into a neighborhood. And that gives you an amazing ethical opportunity no one has ever had before. I hope you will use to the tool of technology to do what you already had it in your heart to do. To connect. To make of this world a brotherhood and a sisterhood.

I hope you will hold tightly to the community you’ve built here because whatever life brings, your success will be sweetened and your setbacks softened if you can share them together. Most of all, I hope you will find happiness and joy, meaning and fulfillment, and a life that gives to you all that you ask of it.

Don’t get hung up on what other people say is practical. Instead, steer your ship into the choppy seas. Look for the rough spots, the problems that seem too big, the complexities that other people are content to work around. It’s in those places that you will find your purpose. It’s there that you can make your greatest contribution.

My wish for you graduates is that you get comfortable with failure, with rejection, accept that it’s a possibility, but never let it define you. And never let it hold you back.

You enter a world of difficulty with open eyes, tasked with writing a story that is not necessarily of your choosing but is still entirely yours. You’re the pride of your parents and grandparents, of aunts, uncles and teachers, of the communities that shaped you in ways seen and unseen. You weren’t promised this day.

Graduates, being a builder is about believing that you cannot possibly be the greatest cause on this Earth, because you aren’t built to last. It’s about making peace with the fact that you won’t be there for the end of the story.

It is in the truly trying moments that the fearless inspire us. Duke graduates, be fearless! Be the last people to accept things as they are. And the first people to stand up and change them for the better.

My point is that if you’re a tortoise – emotionally, economically, intellectually, artistically, or otherwise – don’t despair. You have the rest of your life to create the inventions and the stories that the world needs. Graduates, carve your own marble until you release the invention or story that is yearning to breathe.

I’m here to tell you finding your purpose isn’t enough. The challenge for our generation is creating a world where everyone has a sense of purpose. Today I want to talk about three ways to create a world where everyone has a sense of purpose: by taking on big meaningful projects together, by redefining equality so everyone has the freedom to pursue purpose, and by building community across the world.