Steve Jobs gave a commencement speech at Berkley in 2005.
By this time, Apple had become one of the most successful enterprises of the new Millennium. Jobs was famous for having a set of unique experiences – he believed these were critical in forming his opinions and ideas at Apple.
So how did he know that his past experiences would help create Apple?
Well, he didn’t.
Here’s Steve on predicting the future:
“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. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever.
This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”
-Steve Jobs
From Apple to Chess
When I was a kid, Chess was one of my favorite games.
In Chess you spend most of your energy trying to guess your opponents next move. When they play a knight, your brain visualizes the new locations on the board. You work to understand the updated positions, as each move creates an entirely new game.
“How will this help or hurt me?” you wonder.
Well, Chess is shockingly similar to another game: the game of life.
Unpredictable Paths
Humans are terrible at seeing the future.
We tend to believe that our ability to predict leads to success, however that’s not quite true.
Preventing yourself from making a critical mistake allows you to keep playing the game, but it’s usually the unpredicted events which lead to your victory.
This is the same in businesses as it is in personal development. Odds are that a critical component of you (as you are today) did not exist when you first started. Whether that’s your newfound interest in running 5K races, or the way you pitch to clients.
With this hunch, The New York Times wanted to better understand which career paths most executives took before becoming CEOs.
After interviewing across all fields, one pattern emerged: there was no path.
From musical theater to religion, CEOs were less concerned about their current trajectory in the moment and more focused on learning from each experience.
“Rather than wondering if they are on the right career path, they make the most of whatever path they’re on, wringing lessons from all their experiences.”
New York Times
What about you?
This week, pay more attention to novel differences. While hidden in the background, these may lead to your future successes.
As Steve Jobs points out, you have to trust your gut.
Plus, we all know it’s your unwavering curiosity that really checkmates the King.
Now go setup your board.