The Last Lecture

Finally chionged finished the book in 2days! Juz cant stop reading! N the short chapters makes it alot easier =) For those of you out there who have never heard of Randy Pausch, he's this computer science professor from Carnegie Mellon University who's got pancreatic cancer and doesnt have much time left... He then went on to give a last lecture which is superbly inspiring... Would recommend all to go watch it on YouTube and buy his book... (I can lend u oso la)

The title of his lecture was "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams", and it wasnt abt dying, but abt the importance of living your life to the fullest... There's juz so many practical bits of wisdom in the diff chapters but I'll juz focus on those which I think are the coolest! =)

"When you see yourself doing something badly and nobody's bothering to tell you anymore, that's a bad place to be. You may not want to hear it, but your critics are often the ones telling you they still love and care about you, and want to make you better."

"The brick walls are there for a reason. They're not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something."

"Don't complain, just work harder. Complaining does not work as a strategy. We all have finite time and energy. Any time we spend whining is unlikely to help us achieve our goals. And it won't make us happier."

"Almost everybody has a good side. Just keep waiting. It will come out."

"Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity."

"Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you want."

"Show gratitude. Go out and do for others what somebody did for you."

"As I see it, a parent's job is to encourage kids to develop a joy for life and a great urge to follow their own dreams. The best we can do is to help them develop a personal set of tools for the task."

"A bad apology is worse than no apology. Proper apologies have three parts:
1. What I did was wrong.
2. I feel badly hurt.
3. How do I make this better?
Yes, some people may take advantage of you when you answer question three. But most people will be genuinely appreciative of your make-good efforts. They may tell you how to make it better in some small, easy way. And often, they'll work harder to help make things better themselves."

For more info, check out this website: http://thelastlecture.com/