Textbook: Connecting the Dots | English Kumarbharati Class 10 (Maharashtra SSC Board) PDF Download

 Page 1


Connecting the Dots
Today I want to tell you three stories from my 
life. That’s it. Just three stories. The first story is about 
connecting the dots. I dropped out of Reed College 
after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a 
drop-in for another 18 months before I really quit. 
Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I ever 
made. I could stop taking the required classes that 
didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones 
that looked interesting.
I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the 
floor in friends’ rooms. I returned Coke bottles for the 
5 cent deposits to buy food with, and I would walk 
seven 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. Here’s one example : Reed College offered 
perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. 
Because I had to take a calligraphy class, I learned 
about serif and san serif typefaces, about what makes 
great typography great.
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. If I had never dropped in 
on that course in college the Mac would have never had 
multiple typefaces or for that matter even proportionally 
spaced fonts.
And since Windows just copied Mac, it’s likely 
no personal computer would have them. Of course it 
was impossible to connect the dots looking forward 
l dropped out of :
discountinued, left
l drop in : visitor
l cent : a coin worth
one hundredth of the
US Dollar
l dorm : dormitory
l typography : the
appearance of
printed matter
l Mac : Macintosh
computer
l connect the dots :
associate one idea
(previous to another
(next) to find/create a
new big picture.
Steve Jobs (1955-2011) was an American 
entrepreneur, business magnate, inventor and industrial 
designer. He was the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer 
and co-founder of Apple Inc. He is widely recognized 
as one of the pioneers of the microcomputer revolution 
of the 1970s and 1980s.
u What did Steve Jobs
do for two years
after he joined Reed
College?
u What basic course in
Reed College helped
Jobs while designing
the Mac?
u What hardships did
Jobs face?
62
Page 2


Connecting the Dots
Today I want to tell you three stories from my 
life. That’s it. Just three stories. The first story is about 
connecting the dots. I dropped out of Reed College 
after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a 
drop-in for another 18 months before I really quit. 
Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I ever 
made. I could stop taking the required classes that 
didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones 
that looked interesting.
I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the 
floor in friends’ rooms. I returned Coke bottles for the 
5 cent deposits to buy food with, and I would walk 
seven 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. Here’s one example : Reed College offered 
perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. 
Because I had to take a calligraphy class, I learned 
about serif and san serif typefaces, about what makes 
great typography great.
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. If I had never dropped in 
on that course in college the Mac would have never had 
multiple typefaces or for that matter even proportionally 
spaced fonts.
And since Windows just copied Mac, it’s likely 
no personal computer would have them. Of course it 
was impossible to connect the dots looking forward 
l dropped out of :
discountinued, left
l drop in : visitor
l cent : a coin worth
one hundredth of the
US Dollar
l dorm : dormitory
l typography : the
appearance of
printed matter
l Mac : Macintosh
computer
l connect the dots :
associate one idea
(previous to another
(next) to find/create a
new big picture.
Steve Jobs (1955-2011) was an American 
entrepreneur, business magnate, inventor and industrial 
designer. He was the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer 
and co-founder of Apple Inc. He is widely recognized 
as one of the pioneers of the microcomputer revolution 
of the 1970s and 1980s.
u What did Steve Jobs
do for two years
after he joined Reed
College?
u What basic course in
Reed College helped
Jobs while designing
the Mac?
u What hardships did
Jobs face?
62
when I was in college. But it was very clear looking 
backwards 10 years later.
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 some things  - your gut, 
destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never 
let me down, and it has made all the difference in my 
life.
My second story is about love and loss. I found 
what I loved to do early in life. Woz (Steve Wozniak) 
and I started Apple when I was 20. In 10 years Apple 
had grown from just the two of us in a garage into 
a $2 billion company. And then I got fired. It was 
devastating.
But something slowly began to dawn on me -  I 
still loved what I did. And so I decided to start over.
The heaviness of being successful was replaced by 
the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to 
enter one of the most creative periods of my life. 
During the next five years, I started a company 
Next, another company named Pixar, and fell in love 
with an amazing woman who would become my wife. 
Pixar is now the world’s most successful animation 
studio, Apple bought Next. I returned to Apple and 
the technology we developed at Next is at the heart of 
Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have 
a wonderful family together.
Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. 
Don’t lose faith. The only way to do great work is to 
love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep 
looking. Don’t settle.
My third story is about death.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. 
My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs 
in order, which is doctor’s code for ‘prepare to die’. 
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening 
I had a biopsy. It turned out  to be a very rare form 
of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had 
the surgery and I’m fine now.
l renaissance : rebirth,
revival
l hits you in the
head with a brick
: give a great shock
suddenly.
l gut : courage and
determination
l devastating : causing
severe shock, distress
and grief
l began to dawn on
: began to become
clear to.
u??? What setback did Jobs
suffer when he was
thirty?
u What does the second
story of Jobs convey
to you?
l got fired : lost
the job
63
Page 3


Connecting the Dots
Today I want to tell you three stories from my 
life. That’s it. Just three stories. The first story is about 
connecting the dots. I dropped out of Reed College 
after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a 
drop-in for another 18 months before I really quit. 
Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I ever 
made. I could stop taking the required classes that 
didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones 
that looked interesting.
I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the 
floor in friends’ rooms. I returned Coke bottles for the 
5 cent deposits to buy food with, and I would walk 
seven 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. Here’s one example : Reed College offered 
perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. 
Because I had to take a calligraphy class, I learned 
about serif and san serif typefaces, about what makes 
great typography great.
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. If I had never dropped in 
on that course in college the Mac would have never had 
multiple typefaces or for that matter even proportionally 
spaced fonts.
And since Windows just copied Mac, it’s likely 
no personal computer would have them. Of course it 
was impossible to connect the dots looking forward 
l dropped out of :
discountinued, left
l drop in : visitor
l cent : a coin worth
one hundredth of the
US Dollar
l dorm : dormitory
l typography : the
appearance of
printed matter
l Mac : Macintosh
computer
l connect the dots :
associate one idea
(previous to another
(next) to find/create a
new big picture.
Steve Jobs (1955-2011) was an American 
entrepreneur, business magnate, inventor and industrial 
designer. He was the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer 
and co-founder of Apple Inc. He is widely recognized 
as one of the pioneers of the microcomputer revolution 
of the 1970s and 1980s.
u What did Steve Jobs
do for two years
after he joined Reed
College?
u What basic course in
Reed College helped
Jobs while designing
the Mac?
u What hardships did
Jobs face?
62
when I was in college. But it was very clear looking 
backwards 10 years later.
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 some things  - your gut, 
destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never 
let me down, and it has made all the difference in my 
life.
My second story is about love and loss. I found 
what I loved to do early in life. Woz (Steve Wozniak) 
and I started Apple when I was 20. In 10 years Apple 
had grown from just the two of us in a garage into 
a $2 billion company. And then I got fired. It was 
devastating.
But something slowly began to dawn on me -  I 
still loved what I did. And so I decided to start over.
The heaviness of being successful was replaced by 
the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to 
enter one of the most creative periods of my life. 
During the next five years, I started a company 
Next, another company named Pixar, and fell in love 
with an amazing woman who would become my wife. 
Pixar is now the world’s most successful animation 
studio, Apple bought Next. I returned to Apple and 
the technology we developed at Next is at the heart of 
Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have 
a wonderful family together.
Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. 
Don’t lose faith. The only way to do great work is to 
love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep 
looking. Don’t settle.
My third story is about death.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. 
My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs 
in order, which is doctor’s code for ‘prepare to die’. 
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening 
I had a biopsy. It turned out  to be a very rare form 
of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had 
the surgery and I’m fine now.
l renaissance : rebirth,
revival
l hits you in the
head with a brick
: give a great shock
suddenly.
l gut : courage and
determination
l devastating : causing
severe shock, distress
and grief
l began to dawn on
: began to become
clear to.
u??? What setback did Jobs
suffer when he was
thirty?
u What does the second
story of Jobs convey
to you?
l got fired : lost
the job
63
This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and 
I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. 
Having lived through it, I can now say this to you : 
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone 
else’s life.
Don’t be trapped by dogma  - which is living with 
the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise 
of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice.
And most important, have the courage to follow 
your heart and intuition. They somehow already know 
what you truly want to become.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication 
called The Whole Earth Catalogue. In the final issue, 
on the back cover they put a photograph of an early 
morning country road. Beneath it were the words : Stay 
Hungry, Stay Foolish. It was their farewell message as 
they signed off. I have always wished that for myself. 
And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that 
for you. Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish.  
  - Steve Jobs
l ?drown out : be 
louder than another 
sound and prevent it 
from being heard
l ?intuition : instinctive 
understanding
l ?dogma : belief or 
a set of beliefs 
held by a group or 
organisation which 
others are expected 
to accept without 
argument
l ?anew : in a new or 
different way
l ?Stay Hungry : 
Always keep 
wanting something 
more, something 
new. 
l ?Stay Foolish : 
Always keep an 
open mind. Never 
think you know 
everything. 
u??? What does Jobs warn 
you about life and 
dogma?
u??? How does Jobs close 
his address to the 
graduate students?
Here is a list of twenty amazing life lessons we can all learn from 
Steve Jobs :
(1) Don’t wait.
(2) Make your own reality.
(3) Control everything you can.
(4) Own your mistakes.
(5) Know yourself.
(6) Leave the door open for the fantastic.
(7) Don’t hold back.
(8) Surround yourself with brilliance.
(9) Build a team of ‘A’ players.
(10) Be yourself.
(11) Be persuasive.
(12) Show others the way.
(13) Trust your instincts.
(14) Take risks.
(15) Follow Great with Great.
(16) Make tough decisions.
(17) Presentation can make a world of 
difference.
(18) Find a way to balance your intensity.
(19) Live for today.
(20) Share your wisdom.
64
Page 4


Connecting the Dots
Today I want to tell you three stories from my 
life. That’s it. Just three stories. The first story is about 
connecting the dots. I dropped out of Reed College 
after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a 
drop-in for another 18 months before I really quit. 
Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I ever 
made. I could stop taking the required classes that 
didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones 
that looked interesting.
I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the 
floor in friends’ rooms. I returned Coke bottles for the 
5 cent deposits to buy food with, and I would walk 
seven 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. Here’s one example : Reed College offered 
perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. 
Because I had to take a calligraphy class, I learned 
about serif and san serif typefaces, about what makes 
great typography great.
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. If I had never dropped in 
on that course in college the Mac would have never had 
multiple typefaces or for that matter even proportionally 
spaced fonts.
And since Windows just copied Mac, it’s likely 
no personal computer would have them. Of course it 
was impossible to connect the dots looking forward 
l dropped out of :
discountinued, left
l drop in : visitor
l cent : a coin worth
one hundredth of the
US Dollar
l dorm : dormitory
l typography : the
appearance of
printed matter
l Mac : Macintosh
computer
l connect the dots :
associate one idea
(previous to another
(next) to find/create a
new big picture.
Steve Jobs (1955-2011) was an American 
entrepreneur, business magnate, inventor and industrial 
designer. He was the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer 
and co-founder of Apple Inc. He is widely recognized 
as one of the pioneers of the microcomputer revolution 
of the 1970s and 1980s.
u What did Steve Jobs
do for two years
after he joined Reed
College?
u What basic course in
Reed College helped
Jobs while designing
the Mac?
u What hardships did
Jobs face?
62
when I was in college. But it was very clear looking 
backwards 10 years later.
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 some things  - your gut, 
destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never 
let me down, and it has made all the difference in my 
life.
My second story is about love and loss. I found 
what I loved to do early in life. Woz (Steve Wozniak) 
and I started Apple when I was 20. In 10 years Apple 
had grown from just the two of us in a garage into 
a $2 billion company. And then I got fired. It was 
devastating.
But something slowly began to dawn on me -  I 
still loved what I did. And so I decided to start over.
The heaviness of being successful was replaced by 
the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to 
enter one of the most creative periods of my life. 
During the next five years, I started a company 
Next, another company named Pixar, and fell in love 
with an amazing woman who would become my wife. 
Pixar is now the world’s most successful animation 
studio, Apple bought Next. I returned to Apple and 
the technology we developed at Next is at the heart of 
Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have 
a wonderful family together.
Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. 
Don’t lose faith. The only way to do great work is to 
love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep 
looking. Don’t settle.
My third story is about death.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. 
My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs 
in order, which is doctor’s code for ‘prepare to die’. 
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening 
I had a biopsy. It turned out  to be a very rare form 
of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had 
the surgery and I’m fine now.
l renaissance : rebirth,
revival
l hits you in the
head with a brick
: give a great shock
suddenly.
l gut : courage and
determination
l devastating : causing
severe shock, distress
and grief
l began to dawn on
: began to become
clear to.
u??? What setback did Jobs
suffer when he was
thirty?
u What does the second
story of Jobs convey
to you?
l got fired : lost
the job
63
This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and 
I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. 
Having lived through it, I can now say this to you : 
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone 
else’s life.
Don’t be trapped by dogma  - which is living with 
the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise 
of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice.
And most important, have the courage to follow 
your heart and intuition. They somehow already know 
what you truly want to become.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication 
called The Whole Earth Catalogue. In the final issue, 
on the back cover they put a photograph of an early 
morning country road. Beneath it were the words : Stay 
Hungry, Stay Foolish. It was their farewell message as 
they signed off. I have always wished that for myself. 
And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that 
for you. Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish.  
  - Steve Jobs
l ?drown out : be 
louder than another 
sound and prevent it 
from being heard
l ?intuition : instinctive 
understanding
l ?dogma : belief or 
a set of beliefs 
held by a group or 
organisation which 
others are expected 
to accept without 
argument
l ?anew : in a new or 
different way
l ?Stay Hungry : 
Always keep 
wanting something 
more, something 
new. 
l ?Stay Foolish : 
Always keep an 
open mind. Never 
think you know 
everything. 
u??? What does Jobs warn 
you about life and 
dogma?
u??? How does Jobs close 
his address to the 
graduate students?
Here is a list of twenty amazing life lessons we can all learn from 
Steve Jobs :
(1) Don’t wait.
(2) Make your own reality.
(3) Control everything you can.
(4) Own your mistakes.
(5) Know yourself.
(6) Leave the door open for the fantastic.
(7) Don’t hold back.
(8) Surround yourself with brilliance.
(9) Build a team of ‘A’ players.
(10) Be yourself.
(11) Be persuasive.
(12) Show others the way.
(13) Trust your instincts.
(14) Take risks.
(15) Follow Great with Great.
(16) Make tough decisions.
(17) Presentation can make a world of 
difference.
(18) Find a way to balance your intensity.
(19) Live for today.
(20) Share your wisdom.
64
1. (A) Rearrange the incidents in the life of Steve Jobs in chronological order.
(a) Steve Jobs started Next.
(b) Jobs underwent a surgery.
(c) Jobs learned about serif and sans serif type faces.
(d) Jobs returned to Apple Inc.
(e) Jobs married Laurene.
(f) Jobs was diagnosed with cancer.
(g) Jobs dropped out of Reed College.
(B) Read the third story again. Complete the flow-chart given below.
ENGLISH WORKSHOP 
3 2
Diagnosed with 
cancer
5
7 9
6 4
8
10
Stay hungry, 
stay foolish. 
2. Read the lesson. Refer to a dictionary and match the words in column ‘A’ with their
meanings in column ‘B’.
No ‘A’ ‘B’
(a) diagnosis (i) the power believed to control events
(b) devastating (ii) complete list of items especially in a special order 
and description. 
(c) intuition (iii) act of identifying the nature of a problem or illness. 
(d) calligraphy (iv) power of understadning situations or people’s 
feelings before hand. 
(e) destiny (v) causing great destruction
(f) catalogue (vi) beautiful handwriting done with a special pen or 
brush. 
65
Page 5


Connecting the Dots
Today I want to tell you three stories from my 
life. That’s it. Just three stories. The first story is about 
connecting the dots. I dropped out of Reed College 
after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a 
drop-in for another 18 months before I really quit. 
Looking back, it was one of the best decisions I ever 
made. I could stop taking the required classes that 
didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones 
that looked interesting.
I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the 
floor in friends’ rooms. I returned Coke bottles for the 
5 cent deposits to buy food with, and I would walk 
seven 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. Here’s one example : Reed College offered 
perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. 
Because I had to take a calligraphy class, I learned 
about serif and san serif typefaces, about what makes 
great typography great.
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. If I had never dropped in 
on that course in college the Mac would have never had 
multiple typefaces or for that matter even proportionally 
spaced fonts.
And since Windows just copied Mac, it’s likely 
no personal computer would have them. Of course it 
was impossible to connect the dots looking forward 
l dropped out of :
discountinued, left
l drop in : visitor
l cent : a coin worth
one hundredth of the
US Dollar
l dorm : dormitory
l typography : the
appearance of
printed matter
l Mac : Macintosh
computer
l connect the dots :
associate one idea
(previous to another
(next) to find/create a
new big picture.
Steve Jobs (1955-2011) was an American 
entrepreneur, business magnate, inventor and industrial 
designer. He was the Chairman, Chief Executive Officer 
and co-founder of Apple Inc. He is widely recognized 
as one of the pioneers of the microcomputer revolution 
of the 1970s and 1980s.
u What did Steve Jobs
do for two years
after he joined Reed
College?
u What basic course in
Reed College helped
Jobs while designing
the Mac?
u What hardships did
Jobs face?
62
when I was in college. But it was very clear looking 
backwards 10 years later.
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 some things  - your gut, 
destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never 
let me down, and it has made all the difference in my 
life.
My second story is about love and loss. I found 
what I loved to do early in life. Woz (Steve Wozniak) 
and I started Apple when I was 20. In 10 years Apple 
had grown from just the two of us in a garage into 
a $2 billion company. And then I got fired. It was 
devastating.
But something slowly began to dawn on me -  I 
still loved what I did. And so I decided to start over.
The heaviness of being successful was replaced by 
the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to 
enter one of the most creative periods of my life. 
During the next five years, I started a company 
Next, another company named Pixar, and fell in love 
with an amazing woman who would become my wife. 
Pixar is now the world’s most successful animation 
studio, Apple bought Next. I returned to Apple and 
the technology we developed at Next is at the heart of 
Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have 
a wonderful family together.
Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. 
Don’t lose faith. The only way to do great work is to 
love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep 
looking. Don’t settle.
My third story is about death.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. 
My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs 
in order, which is doctor’s code for ‘prepare to die’. 
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening 
I had a biopsy. It turned out  to be a very rare form 
of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had 
the surgery and I’m fine now.
l renaissance : rebirth,
revival
l hits you in the
head with a brick
: give a great shock
suddenly.
l gut : courage and
determination
l devastating : causing
severe shock, distress
and grief
l began to dawn on
: began to become
clear to.
u??? What setback did Jobs
suffer when he was
thirty?
u What does the second
story of Jobs convey
to you?
l got fired : lost
the job
63
This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and 
I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. 
Having lived through it, I can now say this to you : 
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone 
else’s life.
Don’t be trapped by dogma  - which is living with 
the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise 
of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice.
And most important, have the courage to follow 
your heart and intuition. They somehow already know 
what you truly want to become.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication 
called The Whole Earth Catalogue. In the final issue, 
on the back cover they put a photograph of an early 
morning country road. Beneath it were the words : Stay 
Hungry, Stay Foolish. It was their farewell message as 
they signed off. I have always wished that for myself. 
And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that 
for you. Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish.  
  - Steve Jobs
l ?drown out : be 
louder than another 
sound and prevent it 
from being heard
l ?intuition : instinctive 
understanding
l ?dogma : belief or 
a set of beliefs 
held by a group or 
organisation which 
others are expected 
to accept without 
argument
l ?anew : in a new or 
different way
l ?Stay Hungry : 
Always keep 
wanting something 
more, something 
new. 
l ?Stay Foolish : 
Always keep an 
open mind. Never 
think you know 
everything. 
u??? What does Jobs warn 
you about life and 
dogma?
u??? How does Jobs close 
his address to the 
graduate students?
Here is a list of twenty amazing life lessons we can all learn from 
Steve Jobs :
(1) Don’t wait.
(2) Make your own reality.
(3) Control everything you can.
(4) Own your mistakes.
(5) Know yourself.
(6) Leave the door open for the fantastic.
(7) Don’t hold back.
(8) Surround yourself with brilliance.
(9) Build a team of ‘A’ players.
(10) Be yourself.
(11) Be persuasive.
(12) Show others the way.
(13) Trust your instincts.
(14) Take risks.
(15) Follow Great with Great.
(16) Make tough decisions.
(17) Presentation can make a world of 
difference.
(18) Find a way to balance your intensity.
(19) Live for today.
(20) Share your wisdom.
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1. (A) Rearrange the incidents in the life of Steve Jobs in chronological order.
(a) Steve Jobs started Next.
(b) Jobs underwent a surgery.
(c) Jobs learned about serif and sans serif type faces.
(d) Jobs returned to Apple Inc.
(e) Jobs married Laurene.
(f) Jobs was diagnosed with cancer.
(g) Jobs dropped out of Reed College.
(B) Read the third story again. Complete the flow-chart given below.
ENGLISH WORKSHOP 
3 2
Diagnosed with 
cancer
5
7 9
6 4
8
10
Stay hungry, 
stay foolish. 
2. Read the lesson. Refer to a dictionary and match the words in column ‘A’ with their
meanings in column ‘B’.
No ‘A’ ‘B’
(a) diagnosis (i) the power believed to control events
(b) devastating (ii) complete list of items especially in a special order 
and description. 
(c) intuition (iii) act of identifying the nature of a problem or illness. 
(d) calligraphy (iv) power of understadning situations or people’s 
feelings before hand. 
(e) destiny (v) causing great destruction
(f) catalogue (vi) beautiful handwriting done with a special pen or 
brush. 
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Steve Jobs
curiosity
3.  Go through all the three stories. Identify some qualities of Steve Jobs and complete the 
webchart. 
4. Complete the following table. 
‘The Three Stories in the Life of Steve Jobs’
About Setbacks Reactions Achievements 
and benefits
First story
Second story
Third story 
5. Say HOW?
 l The calligraphy classes helped Steve Jobs after 10 years. 
    
 l You can connect dots. 
   
 l Jobs reacted later on, after the shock of being fired from Apple. 
  
 l Jobs was cured of a rare cancer. 
  
 l Jobs acquired the famous words ‘Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish’ 
  
6. Besides those given at the end of the talk by Steve Jobs, pick out other pieces of advice 
that Jobs gives in his speech. 
    (a) 
    (b)
    (c) 
7. (A) Use the following idioms/phrases in sentences of your own. 
      ? drop it   ? drop out 
      ? stumble on  ? look backwards  
      ? look forward  ? let (someone) down 
      ? sign off  ? begin anew 
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