Stanford University

In a world without digital privacy, even if you have done nothing wrong other than think differently, you begin to censor yourself. Not entirely at first. Just a little, bit by bit. To risk less, to hope less, to imagine less, to dare less, to create less, to try less, to talk less, to think less.

Your mentors may leave you prepared, but they can't leave you ready.

Whatever you do with your life, be a builder. Builders are comfortable in the belief that their life's work will one day be bigger than them — bigger than any one person.

If you're starting a company, you always want to aim for monopoly and you want to always avoid competition. Competition is for losers.

All happy companies are different because they're doing something very unique. All unhappy companies are alike because they failed to escape the essential sameness that is competition.

Start with a really small market and take over that whole market, and then over time find ways to expand that market in concentric circles.

Don't always go through the tiny little door that everyone's trying to rush through. Maybe go around the corner and go through the vast gate that no one's taking.

Optimism is often dismissed as false hope. But there is also false hopelessness. That's the attitude that says we can't defeat poverty and disease. We absolutely can.

So let your heart break. It will change what you do with your optimism.

If our optimism doesn't address the problems that affect so many of our fellow human beings, then our optimism needs more empathy. If empathy channels our optimism, we will see the poverty and the disease and the poor schools — and we will surprise the pessimists.

If you want change, you have to make it. If we want progress, we have to drive it.

Focus on what stirs your soul, because it's hard to excel at anything that you don't love. Be fearless. Don't be afraid to go down fighting if you're fighting a righteous battle.