Patterning your life around other's opinions is nothing more than slavery.
All life is rife with possibilities. Seeds have possibilities, but all their tomorrows are caught by the patterning of their life cycle. Animals have possibilities that are greater than that of a fir tree or a blade of grass. Still, though, for most animals, the pattern of instinct, the patterns of their lives, are very strong. Humanity has a far greater range of possibilities, especially the very young. Who will children grow up to be? Who will they marry, what will they believe, what will they create? Creation is a very powerful seed of possibility.
Design is the patterning and planning of any act toward a desired, foreseeable end. . . any attempt to separate design, to make it a thing-by-itself works, counter to the fact that design is the primary underlying matrix of life.
To be a leader in this new economy, you have to love risk-which means patterning your life on the heroic, not on the strategic. Acting boldly is better than acting knowingly.