It's not about cancer

If you don't know who Randy Pausch is, you should. Dr. Pausch is a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, and he has three to six months to live. And LIVE he will.... This video, "The Last Lecture" is well worth watching even though it is over an hour long. Get comfy, pull up a chair grab a coffee and listen.

Randy Pausch's PhD means he knows a lot about computer science and virtual reality, but this lecture demonstrates that he knows a lot about living life and how to achieve your dreams as well. Key points that resonated with me:

The importance of People Who Help Us: family, friends, collegues, bosses. We can't achieve success alone.
Having lost my mother at an early age, and having a father who was absent in a lot of ways taught me early on to do things myself. I've been spending the last few years unlearning some of that. It's not only OK to ask for help, but sometimes, to really be successful, it takes more than one person, and when you have a team of talented, dedicated people working together you can make a difference in the world.

How people perceive you can limit your ability to succeed.
Like it or not, Perception is reality as any good marketeer will tell you!

Do the right thing and good things have a way of happening.
This is a hard piece of advice, especially when you look around and see people that seem to be successful by cheating or lying, and it looks so easy to do it that way.

Be good at something.
This is another one that's challenging. Sometimes it takes a long time to figure out what you're good at.

Get a feedback loop and listen to it.
This is one of my favorites, I call it a personal mantra. My current mantra is "Live Like There is No Tomorrow" which to me means living life to its fullest, being prepared to take advantage of opportunities, and asking for help if I need it.

What's your personal mantra? Who do you find inspirational? and if you have a minute, say a prayer for Randy Pausch and his family... especially his three children.