商业精英

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.

As you leave Stanford, take your genius and your optimism and your empathy and go change the world in ways that will make millions of others optimistic as well. In the course of your lives, without any plan on your part, you’ll come to see suffering that will break your heart. When it happens, and it will, don’t turn away from it; turn toward it.

5 things I wish I heard at the graduation I never had. I was excited to congratulate them before they begin the next stages of their lives, and share some wisdom I’ve picked up in the decades since I left my own college campus.

In line with the promise of this age, I want to exhort each of the graduates here to take on an issue—a complex problem, a deep inequity, and become a specialist on it. If you make it the focus of your career, that would be phenomenal. But you don’t have to do that to make an impact… don’t let complexity stop you. Be activists. Take on big inequities. I feel sure it will be one of the great experiences of your lives.