Here is an excerpt from the text of the talk where Steve Jobs talks about being fired from Apple. You can find the whole speech at the Stanford News Service website.

…I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.²

These are just some of the ideas Dale Callahan  talks about in his new book “Company of One”, due out this Fall.

People often ask me about investing after they have figured out how to get out of debt and have covered the basic financial goals. (Mostly the Dave Ramsey baby steps. The final step of Dave’s is about building wealth.)

There are tons of strategies out there which work and which work well – and of course there are hair brained strategies sold by so called gurus which are loosers. For the most part, I see people with no strategy at all. Dave would say – “invest in quality mutual funds with a 10 year track record.” That does leave you hanging a bit, but Dave’s business is not about investing and wealth building. For years I did this with my own research and efforts. While it worked – I was always questioning myself and my research. 

Now I typically invest in funds and use the SoundMindInvesting newsletter as my guide. It is simple and has been very profitable. 

Here is how it works….

You get the newsletter and decide on your investing strategy- Upgrading or Just the Basics. (upgrading requires monthly adjustment – Just the Basics requires only annual adjustments)  
1. Open a brokerage account. (He tells you about them in the letter.) I have accounts with Fidelity, ScottTrade, and Ameritrade – all have pros/cons – but all basically the same.  
2. Then from your account – you invest into the funds per his guidelines.

I have found the returns to beat the market and blow away most company 401k mixtures of funds.  They are down the last month or so – but overall do very well.

See the website at http://www.soundmindinvesting.com/ and the latest newsletter is attached.