[This is the second of three reflections on Steve Jobs' speech to the Stanford Class of 2005. Given the significance of the message as 1.4 million Americans graduate college this Spring, I felt it would be good to revisit Mr. Jobs' address. The commentary here expresses my views, not his – I don't mean to put words in his mouth or make implications about his worldview. AL]

Steve Jobs told Stanford’s 2005 graduates that dropping out of college was one of the best decisions he ever made — and getting fired by Apple in 1985 was “the best thing that ever could have happened to me.”

How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating. I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down — that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me – I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

In the five years that followed, Jobs started NeXT (where the heart of the new Macintosh operating system was conceived) and Pixar, now the world’s most successful animation studio (recently acquired by Disney for a staggering sum). He also fell in love and married and started a family. Getting fired made him a beginner again – “less sure about everything,” and launched one of the most creative periods of his life.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And 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. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

This idea is close to the heart of InsideWork. It’s a given that people sometimes have to work to pay the bills. That said, we contend the best work springs from passion. We agree with Dorothy Sayers:

(Work is to be seen) not as a necessary drudgery to be undergone for the purpose of making money, but as a way of life in which the nature of man should find its proper exercise and delight and so fulfill itself to the glory of God. That it should, in fact, be thought of as a creative activity undertaken for the love of work itself; and that man, made in God’s image, should make things as God makes them, for the sake of doing well a thing that is well worth doing.

— Dorothy L. Sayers, “Why Work?” Creed or Chaos, Sophia Institute Press 1949, page 89

I know people who apologize for their work because they believe it would be better if they were occupied in some sort of “ministry” (by which they mean a church or a 501(c)(3) nonprofit religious mission). I think I know where this idea comes from and I’m sure it’s well intentioned — I just don’t think it’s a biblical idea.

If you want the biblical idea about work, you’ll have to read the Bible (I suppose that’s self-evident but it’s surprising how many people rely on sermons and religious books and other pre-digested forms of instruction instead of reading the Bible for themselves).

• If you want to see what it means to be a worker, read the opening chapters of Genesis.
• If you want a reality check on the tensions between work and reward, read the book of Ecclesiastes.
• Read what the apostle Paul said about work in Acts 20:32-35.
• Read Paul’s advice to workers in 1 Thessalonians 4:11-12.
• For a guided tour through the Bible’s view of work, check out The Meaning of Work from the Scriptural Roots of Commerce series.

Whatever you do, I say take Steve Jobs’ advice: Don’t settle. Find work that’s meaningful and pursue it as if it’s what you were created to do. I believe you’ll create value for your community and honor the Creator who made you to work.