“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 in your future. 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
I’m not sure when I first heard this quote from Steve Jobs, but my initial thought was that he meant to try many things without worrying too much because, at some point, you’ll figure it out. You just have to explore and try different things to see what suits you best.
A few years ago, my biggest fear was not being successful, even though I didn’t know what success meant or how to define it. Do I know what it means now? No, I don’t think so.
But here’s what I do know: success doesn’t have to be about how much money you have, driving a nice car bought with your parents’ money, or having multiple girlfriends. These used to be my markers of success. But this year, I started to see things differently. I began reevaluating, reconsidering, and rethinking what I believed success to be. I’ve come to the conclusion that maybe success is more about surpassing your past self, achieving the small goals you set daily. It’s not about showing off to others but proving to yourself how far you can go.
Maybe success is just a noun. Maybe it means different things to different people, or maybe it means nothing at all.
A visit to Starbucks to meet Bong Say Leng reminded me of Steve Jobs’ phrase. Say Leng is a friend of Rod from university, and that’s about all I knew.
During our meeting at Starbucks, we had a Q&A session about his academic and professional career. His story fascinated me because he ended up working in a completely different field than what he studied in university.
I forgot what major he studied, but he has been working in finance and sales at Starbucks for years. During the Q&A session, he mentioned that he had worked at a waste management company before joining Starbucks. He saw ways the company could save money by being more efficient and effective in its operations. This sparked his curiosity about numbers and finding ways to make the company more profitable. He took on new challenges to learn about finance, a field he had never studied before, and those opportunities drove him to where he is today.
In the past four years at Rodwell, I have learned many skills from scratch. I went from being a shy boy without the confidence to talk to students to someone who can give advice and make space for others, gaining their trust. I borrowed school desktops to learn how to edit videos, creating personal travel vlogs and editing videos for the school’s Facebook page. I evolved from being a volunteer at events to organizing projects. I gained the courage to speak so that everyone could understand me. I came as a provincial boy dreaming of higher education and am now close to graduating from a top international university. Yet, despite all this, I feel unsatisfied. I feel like I didn’t push myself hard enough, like I’m just mediocre. It doesn’t seem like my dots are connecting in the way Steve Jobs described, and Bong Say Leng’s story doesn’t resonate with mine. It feels like my efforts have left me with uncertainty.
So, I have one hope: that in the end, it will all make sense, even if it doesn’t seem to now. Hopefully.
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