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  • I've had several people come up to me and say, “What can I do to be you?”  And

  • the only aspect of me that’s really doable is I can tell you what my academic pedigree

  • is and what I did as a kid and what things interested me, but what I do day-to-day is

  • not the fulfillment of some preexisting job descriptionIt’s just things that I took

  • interest in on my own that the general public happened to also appreciate or like or want

  • access to.  And so within my job description as Director of the Hayden Planetarium and

  • as an educator, as an astrophysicist, I kept accreting other things that I did that people

  • responded to, positively responded toSo, I can tell you about the academic pedigree

  • The rest, you have to create what it is that you do best that layers onto the formal training

  • that may be behind it. I think the greatest of people that have ever

  • been in society, they were never versions of someone elseThey were themselves

  • You don’t think about Michael Jordan the basketball player and say, “Oh, he was just

  • like this other player.”  No, you don’t even say, “He was like this player plus

  • that player divided by two plus this.”  NoHe’s Michael Jordan.  I think the

  • greatest of people in society carved niches that represented the unique expression of

  • their combinations of talents, and if everyone had the luxury of expressing the unique combinations

  • of talents in this world, our society would be transformed overnightIt’s the great

  • tragedy -- people employed in ways that don’t fully tap everything they do best in life.

  •   I am privileged and I don’t take a day for

  • granted on the job about the fact that what I do, what people most warmly receive about

  • what I do, are some of the things that I do best in life.  I'm honored and flattered

  • by that combination of facts as they apply to meSo, your task is to find the combination

  • of facts that apply to youThen people will beat a path to your door.

I've had several people come up to me and say, “What can I do to be you?”  And

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