Steve Jobs succeeded by constantly unlearning his own identity rather than clinging to it. Instead of saying "I'm the iPod guy," he stayed anchored to a mission and let that drive decisions, pivoting the company toward the iPhone. This fluid sense of purpose, not a fixed self-image, enabled his innovation.
I'm going to assert that, and I never spoke to Steve Jobs, but I'm going to assert that what he did was, was he was able to unlearn his identity and not be stuck with it. And so what he had, what would he would be more left with, more empowering is, this is what I stand for, this is what I'm committed to. And that becomes his True north, as opposed to the identity that's really fixed. Because you can stand for one thing today, and once it's fulfilled, you create a new stand that becomes this platform for people to join you. So I stand for this listening device for— with 1,000 songs. iPod, done. Okay, now I'm standing for that iPod being a cell phone. How do we do that, Steve? Well, that's what we're standing for. And I'm committed that, you know, we have the best. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. As opposed to saying, I'm the leader, you do what I say. And so people will say, well, how do I unlearn this identity? How do I get out of that? And it's, it's not like you read a book and it has the 3 steps that you get out of it. It's more like Navy SEAL training.
