The Journey Of Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs started facing challenges throughout his whole life. At birth, he was put up for adoption which, although hard to embrace at first, would end up being one of the experiences that helped him to be so successful. When Steve was just six years old his neighbor found out he was adopted and teased him, which hurt him deeply. He told Steve his parents did not want him, which was the reason he was put up for adoption. He ran home to his adoptive parents who guaranteed him that he was special because they chose only him. From then on, Jobs had a sense of being special. Steve Jobs felt he was on a journey throughout his life. He often said, “The journey was the reward.” (“Jobs' Biography: Thoughts On Life, Death And Apple” 3). That journey involved realizing and resolving conflicts about his role in the world: why he was here and what it was about. Jobs advanced through his adolescent life strongly disliking the forced authority he must obey in a classroom. He resisted education to the maximum, but his unwillingness to continue on through college is what ironically led him to create the company, Apple, and direct it to become the 15th biggest company in the world (“The World’s Biggest Public Companies”). Through the practices of Zen Buddhism, Jobs became an effective leader as well as learned how to stand strong, and fight against upper authority from his early life to college to his firing from Apple’s board of directors

Even though Steve Jobs was very demanding and not at all understanding, he was still a very effective leader. He credits most of his success to his involvement in Zen Buddhism, beginning at the early age of thirteen. Zen Buddhism was a main contributor to most of the characteristics that makes Jobs such an eff...

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...s was a very strong individual who fought back against the challenges he faced through his childhood from being adopted. He knew what he wanted and when he wanted it, and he would not let anybody get in his way, no matter who they were. He had the courage and the guts, something most people do not have today, to stick up for what mattered most to him. Through Zen Buddhism, Steve Jobs learned many of the skills it took to become an effective leader that ultimately saved Apple from bankruptcy and turned the whole thing around. Steve Jobs was a great leader who achieved success by fighting through the oppression of authority which tried to keep him from reaching his goals. “He will forever be remembered as this generation’s Thomas Edison, Henry Ford and Walt Disney” (Karlgaard 8), a man who exerted control on all facets of his company and one who has built the future.