1、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?我在里德学院读了六个月之后就退学了，但是在十八个月以后，我还经常去学校。我为什么要退学呢?It started before I was born.My biological mother was a young,unwed college graduate student,
2、and she decided to put me up for adoption.She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates,so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife.Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl.So my parents,w
3、ho were on a waiting list,got a call in the middle of the night asking：“We have an unexpected baby boy;do you want him?”They said：“Of course.”My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school.She refused to si
4、gn the final adoption papers.She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.This was the start in my life.故事要从我的出生说起。我的亲生母亲是一名年轻未婚的大学毕业生。她决定让别人收养我，她十分想让大学毕业生收养我。所以在我出生前，她已经准备一切，让一位律师和他的妻子收养。但是她没有料到，在我出生后，律师夫妇突然决定要一个女孩。所以，我的养父养母（他们当时还在候选名单上）突然在半夜接到了一个
5、电话：“我们有一个意外降生的男婴，你们想收养他吗?”他们回答说：“当然!”但是我亲生母亲随后发现，我的养母从未上过大学，我的养父高中没毕业。于是她拒绝签订收养合同。但在几个月以后，因为我的养父养母答应她一定要让我上大学，她才心软同意了。但是面对地狱，我的乐观精神并没有减退，反而使我变得更加乐观。我上了车，对与我们共事的医生说：“是的，我知道MDR-TB很难治愈。但我们应该能为这些人做一些事”。我们在今年进入了一项新的肺结核药物疗法的第三阶段。根据参与疗法的病人的反馈，以前18个月的治疗费用为2000美元，治愈率只有50%，而如今六个月的治疗费用在100美元以下，治愈率能达到80%到90%。失败
6、率能降到百分之一就更好了。And 17 years later I did go to college.But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford,and all of my working-class parentssavings were being spent on my college tuition.After six months,I couldnt see the value in it.I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life a
7、nd no idea how college was going to help me figure it out.And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life.So I decided to drop out and would all work out OK.It was pretty scary at the time,but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made.The minute I drop
8、ped out I could stop taking the required classes that didnt interest me,and begin dropping in on the ones that looked far more interesting.在十七岁那年，我的确上大学了。但我天真地选择了一个几乎和斯坦福大学一样贵的学校，我父母还处于工薪阶层，为了交学费，他们几乎耗光所有积蓄。六个月后，我几乎看不到在学校的价值。我不知道（我生命中）要追求什么，我也不知道学校是否能帮我找到答案。但在学校，我将花光我父母这一辈子的积蓄。所以，我决定退学，并且我相信车到山前必有路。
9、（不可否认），我当时非常害怕，但现在回头来看，这个决定是我一生中最明智决定之一。在我做出退学决定后，我再也不用去上那些我丝毫没有兴趣的必修课，我开始去听那些看起来有趣的课程。今天，只是毕业，我们之间的师生情谊、同学友爱将伴随着时间的推移不断升级。浙江林学院，已经成为一次又一次默化在我们心中永远无法抹去的记忆;东湖校区，将是我们心中永远的圣地。It wasnt all romantic.I didnt have a dorm room,so I slept on the floor in friendsrooms,I returned coke bottles for the 5deposits
10、 to buy food with,and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple.I loved it.And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on.Let me give you one example：这一点也不罗曼蒂克。没了宿舍，所以我要
11、到朋友家睡地板;为了填饱肚子，我捡过值5美分的可乐罐;为了每周一顿的好一点的饭，每个星期天晚上，我穿街过巷，步行7英里到Hare Krishna教堂。我喜欢那里的饭菜。在好奇和直觉的引导下，我跌跌撞撞地遇到很多东西，这些后来被证明是无价瑰宝。我给你们举一个例子吧：Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country.Throughout the campus every poster,every label on every drawer,was beautifully
12、 hand calligraphed.Because I had dropped out and didnt have to take the normal classes,I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this.I learned about serif and san serif typefaces,about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations,about what makes great typography
13、 great.It was beautiful,historical,artistically subtle in a way that science cant capture,and I found it fascinating.那时候，里德学院的书法课程也许是全美最好的。学校里的每个海报，抽屉上的每个标签，上面全都是漂亮的书法。因为我退学了，没有了正常的课程，所以我决定去上/书法课，去学学怎样写出漂亮的字。我学到了san serif 和serif字体，我学会了怎么样在不同的字母组合之中变化间距，还有怎么样做最好的版式。那种美感、真实感和艺术感，是科学永远不能捕捉到的，（我发现）那实在是太
14、迷人了。None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life.But ten years later,when we were designing the first Macintosh computer,it all came back to me.And we designed it all into the Mac.It was the first computer with beautiful typography.If I had never dropped in on that single cou
15、rse in college,the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts.And since Windows just copied the Mac,its likely that no personal computer would have them.If I had never dropped out,I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class,and personal computers might not
16、 have the wonderful typography that they do.Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college.But it was very,very clear looking backwards ten years later.当时这些东西似乎在我生命中没什么可用之处。但十年之后，当我们在设计第一台Macintosh计算机的时候，就全部派上用场。我把当时我学的那些东西全都融入到Mac。那是拥有漂亮字体的第一台计算机。如果我当时没有退学，我没机
17、会沉迷于书法课程，Mac就不会有种类繁多或的行距整齐的字体。如果Windows没有抄袭Mac，个人电脑很可能就不会这么多字体。如果我没有退学，我不会沉迷于书法课程，个人电脑很可能就不会这么多字体。当然了，我在学校的时候不可能把这些点点滴滴提前串连起来。但在十年之后回顾过去，这些东西历历在目。Again,you cant connect the dots looking forward;you can only connect them looking backwards.So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in you
18、r future.You have to trust in something your gut,destiny,life,karma,whatever.This approach has never let me down,and it would made all the difference.再说一次，你不可能把这些点点滴滴提前串连起来;你只能在回顾的时候把它们串连起来。所以你必须相信这些点点滴滴是和你的未来项链的。你必须要相信某些东西：直觉、命运、生命、因缘等等。这个方法从未让我失望过，它让我与众不同。My second story is about love and loss.我的第
19、二个故事是关于爱和失去。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 employees.We had just released our finest creation t
20、he Macintosh a year earlier,and I had just turned 30.And then I got fired.How can you get fired from a company you started?Well,as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me,and for the first year or so things went well.But then our visions of the future b
21、egan to diverge and eventually we had a falling out.When we did,our Board of Directors sided with him.So at 30 I was out.And very publicly out.What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone,and it was devastating.我非常幸运，因为我在很早的时候就找到了我钟爱的东西。我在二十岁的时候，沃兹和我在父母的车库里面开创了苹果公司。我们努力工作，十年之后，苹果从只有两个的穷小
22、子的车库公司，发展到了员工超过四千名、市值超过二十亿的大公司。在公司成立的第九年，我们刚刚发布了最好的产品Macintosh。我也快要到而立之年了。后来，我被炒鱿鱼了。你怎么可能被你自己创立的公司炒了鱿鱼呢?在苹果快速成长的时候，我们雇用了一个很有天分的家伙和我一起管理这个公司，在最初的几年风调雨顺。但是后来我们对公司未来的看法有了分歧，最终我们吵了起来。当吵的不可开交的时候，董事会站在了他的那一边。所以在三十岁的时候，我被炒鱿鱼了。公开地把我扫地出门了。曾经是我整个生命的中心已经不再有了，这让我不知所措。I really didnt know what to do for a few mon
23、ths.I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down –that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me.I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly.I was a very public failure,and I even thought about running away from the v
24、alley.But something slowly began to dawn on me I still loved what I did.The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit.I had been rejected,but I was still in love.And so I decided to start over.有几个月，我真是不知道该做些什么。我觉得我很令上一代的企业家们很失望，因为我把他们交给我的接力棒弄丢了。我把事情搞砸了，我和（创办HP的）David Packard和（创办Intel的）Bob
25、 Noyce见面，并试图向他们道歉。在公众面前，我是个失败者，我甚至想过逃离硅谷。但我后来慢慢看到了曙光，我仍然喜爱我从事的一切。在苹果发生的风波，并没有丝毫改变这一点。虽然我被驱逐了，但是我仍然钟爱我所做的事情。所以我决定从头再来。I didnt see it then,but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me.The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightn
26、ess of being a beginner again,less sure about everything.It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.我当时没有觉察，但是事后证明，被苹果扫地出门是我这一生经历的最好的事。因为，作为一个创业者的轻松感觉重新替代作为一个成功者的负重感，不要把每件事情都看得那么重。它（扫地出门）把我释放出来，让我进入了我生命中最有创造力的一个阶段。During the next five years,I started a company named NeXT,anothe
27、r company named Pixar,and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife.Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film,Toy Story,and is now the most successful animation studio in the world.In a remarkable turn of events,Apple bought NeXT,I returned to Apple,an
28、d the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apples current renaissance.And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.在接下来的五年里，我创立了一个名叫NeXT的公司，还有一个叫Pixar的公司，还有和一位魅力女士相识并相爱，她后来成为我的妻子。Pixar 制作了全球第一部由电脑制作的动画电影“玩具总动员”，Pixar现在也是全球上最成功的电脑制作工作室。在随后一系列运作中，苹果收购了NeXT，我重返苹果。我们在NeXT研发的技术是苹果重焕生机
29、的关键。而且，我还和Laurence共同建立了一个幸福完美的家庭。同时，也不要只为自己而活。想要得到真正的快乐，除了活在当下，你还得为一个比自己更大的意义而活。往前行必须有所奉献，生命中最可贵的，就是你能够奉献。Im pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadnt been fired from Apple.It was awful tasting medicine,but I guess the patient needed it.Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick.
30、Dont lose faith.Im convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did.Youve got to find what you love.And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers.Your work is going to fill a large part of your life,and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work.And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.If you havent found it yet,keep looking.And dont settle.As with all matters of the heart,youll know when you find it.And,like any great relationship,it just gets better and better as
