The great accomplishment of Jobs’s life is how effectively he put his idiosyncrasies—his petulance, his narcissism, and his rudeness—in the service of perfection.

—Malcolm Gladwell, “The Tweaker”

Steve was among the greatest of American innovators — brave enough to think differently, bold enough to believe he could change the world, and talented enough to do it. By building one of the planet’s most successful companies from his garage, he exemplified the spirit of American ingenuity. By making computers personal and putting the internet in our pockets, he made the information revolution not only accessible, but intuitive and fun. And by turning his talents to storytelling, he has brought joy to millions of children and grownups alike. Steve was fond of saying that he lived every day like it was his last. Because he did, he transformed our lives, redefined entire industries, and achieved one of the rarest feats in human history: he changed the way each of us sees the world.

—Barack Obama

In its 400+ year history, the corporation has achieved extraordinary things, cutting around-the-world travel time from years to less than a day, putting a computer on every desk, a toilet in every home (nearly) and a cellphone within reach of every human.

—”A Brief History of the Corporation“

And that’s what [a startup is] like – all superlatives. Your highs are super high. Crack. Your lows are unexplainably low and lonely. It’s the startup roller coaster world. And I miss it.

—Mark Suster, Should You Really Be A Startup Entrepreneur?

The Next Big Thing already exists. It’s just a matter of thinking like an artist — of trying to take something that already exists and repurposing it for something it wasn’t intended for.

—Biz Stone, as quoted in “Social Media Grows Up”

Client: “Who is this?”

Me: “This is Josh from Rainsong Media. You sent in a request about facebook fan page design. How can we help?”

Client: “Facebook design?”

Me: “Yes.”

Client: “You design facebook?”

Me: “Well, we design facebook fan page tabs and profile pictures for businesses and groups. What were you looking for?”

Client: “Facebook design.”

Me: [pause] “Do you have a business of some kind?”

Client: “I don’t have no business.”

Me: “Okay… so maybe there was some miscommunication?”

Client: “Bye.”

Silicon Valley companies squabble incessantly and viciously over personnel. Employees change hands like poker chips, and right now Facebook has the best hand at the table. Everyone at Facebook was a star somewhere else: Taylor, for example, led the team that created — maybe you’ve heard of it? — Google Maps. You don’t get a lot of shy, retiring types at Facebook. These are the kinds of power nerds to whom the movies don’t do justice: fast-talking, user-friendly, laser-focused and radiating the kind of confidence that gives you a sunburn. Sorkin did a much better job of representing Facebook when he wrote The West Wing.

—Lev Grossman, “Person of the Year 2010: Mark Zuckerberg“

While the modern medical name for the feeling produced by a new challenge or large goal is stress, for countless generations it went by the old, familiar name of fear. Even now, I’ve found that the most successful people are the ones who gaze fear unblinkingly. Instead of relying on terms like anxiety, stress, or nervousness, they speak openly of being frightened by their responsibilities and challenges. Here’s Jack Welch, the past CEO of General Electric: “Everyone who is running something goes home at night and wrestles with the same fear: Am I going to be the one who blows this place up?” Chuck Jones, the creator of Pepe le Pew and Wile E. Coyote, emphasized that “fear is the most important factor in any creative work.” And Sally Ride, the astronaut, is unafraid to talk plainly of fear: “All adventures, especially into new territory, are scary.”

I was puzzled why so many remarkable people preferred the word fear to stress or anxiety. The answer came to me one day while I was observing physicians in the course of their training. I was following one of our family-practice resident physicians through the course of her day in the health center, seeing children and adults for the wide variety of maladies that bring people to a primary care physician. I noticed that when adults came to see a physician and talk about their emotional pain, they chose words such as stress, anxiety, depression, nervous, and tense. But when I observed children talking about their feeling, they talked about being scared, sad, or afraid.

It’s my conclusion that the reason for the difference in word choice had less to do with the symptoms and more to do with expectations. The children assumed their feelings were normal. Children know they live in a world they cannot control. They have no say in whether their parents are in a good mood or bad, or whether their teachers are nice or mean. They understand that fear is a part of their lives.

Adults, I believe, assume that if they are living correctly, they can control the event around them. When fear does appear, it seems all wrong–so adults prefer to call it by the names for psychiatric disease. Fear becomes a disorder, something to put in a box with a tidy label of “stress” or “anxiety.”

This approach to fear is unproductive. If your expectation is that a well-run life should always be orderly, you are setting yourself up for panic and defeat. If you assume that a new job or relationship or health goal is supposed to be easy, you will feel angry and confused when fear arises–and do anything to make it disappear.

To me, stress usually means “too much going on for me to process efficiently.” But I’ve used it in terms of fear as well, especially regarding public speaking when I was younger.