What do you want to be remembered for?

Sandeep Laxman
2 min readAug 30, 2014

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  • Alexander, the great is remembered today for conquering almost half of the world with his innovative war strategies.
  • Mahatma Gandhi is remembered for his non-violent crusade against the British to give India its independence.
  • Napoleon Bonaparte is remembered for his war strategies.
  • Aldof Hitler is remembered for persecuting millions of Jews and starting the second world war.
  • Chandragupta Maurya is remembered for building the Magdha Empire and defeating Alexander, the great.
  • Leonidas is remembered for fighting the mighty Persians with an army of just 300.
  • Xerxes is remembered for expanding the Persian empire.
  • Steve Jobs is remembered for changing the face of the PC & the mobile phone industries.
  • Henry Ford is remembered for starting the automobile revolution.
  • The Mogul King, Akbar is remembered for his sense of justice & equality
  • Birbal, one of the 9 jewels in Akbar’s court, is remembered for this intelligence.
  • Bill Gates is remembered for starting the PC revolution.
  • Florence Nightingale is remembered fondly as the Lady with the Lamp.
  • Mother Teresa is remembered for the spending her life helping those who were cared for by none.
  • Douglas Jardine is remembered with architecting the Bodyline series.
  • Sir Don Bradman is remembered for changing the way Cricket was played.
  • Richard Feynman is remembered as the coolest scientist ever.
  • Einstein is remembered for his Theory of Relativity.
  • Nelson Mandela is remembered for his fight for equality.

What is common among everyone in the list above? None of them are remembered for the amount of wealth they had accumulated. In fact, most people that history remembers are not known for the monetary net worth. They are all remembered for the way the impacted and changed the world they lived in.

Today, we live in world where (almost) everyone is working hard to earn more wealth. But the truth is that no one will remember you for the amount of money you made. History will only remember you for the way you changed the world. Money is just a byproduct.

So ask yourself today:

“What do I want to be remembered for?”

If you liked reading this article, you should follow me @sanlaxman

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