Today would have been Steve Jobs’ 60th birthday. I learned this because Seth Godin has named today Make a Ruckus Day, celebrating the man who once said, “I want to put a ding in the universe” and consistently encouraged people to make a difference.
As Godin points out, “Jobs’ contribution wasn’t invention. Technology breakthroughs didn’t come out of his basement the way they did from Land or Tesla. Instead, his contribution was to have a point of view. To see something and say ‘yes’ or ‘no’.”
Jobs (and Godin) remind us to not only have a point of view, but to change it when the times demanded. Most of all, to express that point of view, to act on it, to live with it.
The ruckus that matters most to me is finding what you believe in and using that as a springboard to create a better world. The world needs all of us to make change.
Nobel Peace Prize winner Jody Williams, in this RSA Short explains why it’s so important that we strive to make a difference.
At the SHIFT Summit last summer, I dared everyone to make change a priority.
I closed the event with a talk about why we each need to spend time shifting the world. Everyone around us. The systems we rely on. The communities we live in.
Here’s to us all of us making a ruckus today — and every day.