Thursday, August 5, 2010

A Choice to Be Clever or Be Kind

Cleverness is a gift. Kindness is a choice.
~ Jeff Bezos, Amazon Founder

In May, Jeff Bezos addressed the 2010 graduating class at Princeton University. In the segment that follows, Bezos offers a thoughtful anecdote about what matters more than talents and concludes his speech by exhorting the students to go "build yourself a great story." Whatever our stage of life, we all, I think, have the opportunity to create our own lasting story. It simply takes heeding Bezos' advice to remember that "we are our choices."

7 comments:

sarah said...

build yourself a great story. I love this!! :-)

A. Jay Adler said...

The students in that graduating class who are truly clever, and who will be kind, will remember that address the rest of their lives.

Action is character; character is action.

Anonymous said...

time to flip the tassel

S. Etole said...

kindness can accomplish so much ....

Kathleen Overby said...

wow, what a banquet to feast on for a long while. Thx.

Dr. Cyndi said...

Nice... I love great commencement speeches. We should all have one in May, just like students, to commemorate the year!

Louise Gallagher said...

Build a great story -- we all have the capacity and power to build our own great story of life.