In Defense of Your Benefactors

  • By Deane Ogden
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life

    Yesterday was an interesting day. After a pretty lengthy discussion with a handful of you in a Google+ Hangout about the topic of yesterday's post, I received some emails and saw several G+ comments about my statement "There is no such thing as a self-made man." Some people were a little defensive of that, explaining to me that they, in actuality, have carved out their careers on their own and that for me to take that away from them not only stems from an assumption I'm making based on my experience, but it's also just a crappy thing to say.

    I was pretty clear on my views about why I feel the way I do about the "self-made" proclamation, both in the post and in the chat that followed it, but I will admit there were some salient points made that challenged me to think a little more critically. I began having some second thoughts on my view of the "self-made" concept based on a few key perspectives that made some sense... and then the unthinkable happened: Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs died.

    After contemplating the effects of his passing last night with some friends and then waking up on the other side with the knowledge that he's not in the world anymore, I stand by my former statement: "There is no such thing as a self-made man."

    I shot this quick video to better explain why I still know that to be true.

    If you cannot see the video below, click here.