The next story in The Abundance Project’s “From Poverty to Abundance” series is about a man who changed the face of mobile technology. The ability to share information and access the internet on a mobile device has literally changed the world of communication, and impacts just about every aspect of human life. Nowadays, you don’t go anywhere without your smartphone at your side. The genius behind this life-altering innovation is no other than Steve Jobs, who had a vision and a plan to bring these miracles of modern convenience to life.
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Steve Jobs as a baby
Given up for adoption at birth to a working class couple, Steve Jobs didn’t start out life with obvious indications that he would go on to do something that would change the world, as well as make him extremely rich. Far from it. He was an LSD-dropping hippie in high school and college. He seemed to drift from job to job, and fathered a child with his high school sweetheart, but was absent from his child’s life for many years.
In high school, he was introduced to Steve Wozniak who would eventually become his partner and co-founder of Apple Computers. In college, Jobs didn’t experience much success. He dropped out of Reed College after only one semester, mainly because he didn’t want to burden his adoptive parents with the costs of his expensive private college education. After dropping out, he lived on the couches of friends and supported himself by returning soda bottles for deposit money. For food, he’d live on the free meals handed out by the Hare Krishna temple near campus.
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Jobs and Wozniak founded Apple Computers in 1976 and worked out of Jobs’ garage.
Throughout Jobs’ early years, he maintained a fascination for technology and, together with a vision to change the face of technology, he and his friend Steve Wozniak partnered up to found Apple Computers. They began their venture in the Jobs garage and was funded by the two selling some of their things, including Jobs’ VW bus, and Wozniak’s precious scientific calculator.
Jobs and Wozniak are credited for revolutionizing personal computing by making a machine that was much smaller, cheaper and powerful anything made before. After achieving massive success, he was dealt one of the most humiliating corporate ousters in Silicon Valley when the board of directors of Apple fired him. Jobs sold all his Apple shares and headed other tech companies before being brought back onboard at Apple when Apple bought out Next Computing.
first_generation_classic_iSteve Jobs promptly introduced the iPod which changed the world of mobile music and revitalized the company. The iPod’s success brought Apple’s stock price back from record lows. In 2007, the release of the iPhone literally changed the world of mobile technology and created the beginning of what would soon be known as “The Apple Effect.” If you’re not sure what that is, try going to a cell phone provider on the day Apple releases a new phone. Not to mention the fact that once a new Apple product is released, other companies set out to make something comparable. I think you get the idea. With the creation of these new technologies, Jobs’ net worth zoomed to the billions. Here are 3 life lessons you can take away from his story:
Lesson #1: Your beginnings do not determine your endings.
Steve Jobs was completely self-made. He came from very humble beginnings, and was not provided with a hand up. His parents allowed him to work out of their garage, but they didn’t have money to invest in his ideas. Moreover, he was saddled with the psychological consequences of being given up at birth. We all have to live with the reality that we may not be born geniuses, rich, or naturally blessed. In fact, many of us are born into really harsh family lives.
But all that doesn’t matter if we believe in the power of our dreams. If people with much less resources managed to succeed, we can choose to do so too. Success is measured not by what advantages you began with but how far you got with the hand life dealt you. Don’t ever use your humble beginnings as an excuse for your inability to achieve success.