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Hollywood actor and Crazy Rich Asians star Henry Golding carried around a notebook detailing all sorts of advice <\/strong>from the \u201crandom musings\u201d of strangers to wisdom from 20th century artists. He lived by one quote during his career transitions from being a hairstylist in London, to a travel host for the BBC, to big-budget movie star.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n Inspiration can strike in the most unlikely of places\u2014from Nvidia<\/a> CEO Jensen Huang saying a gardener taught him one of<\/a> \u201cmost profound learnings\u201d in his life, to Uber<\/a>\u2019s cofounders creating their company to fix a common inconvenience. Hollywood actor Henry Golding also spent years penning words of wisdom from strangers on the fly, finding power behind the random musings of locals to coveted writers.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I was living in London, [I] must have been about 19, 20-ish, I would go around with a notebook and write bits of advice that I heard, or some random musings from the local drunk, or anything that I would come across,\u201d Golding tells Fortune. \u201cIt was the romantic period of a young man coming into his adulthood and trying to find mentorship.\u201d<\/p>\n Golding was going through quite a career transformation at the time he penciled down his favorite quotes. From the age of 17 to 22 he was a hair stylist working at high-end salon Richard Ward in London\u2019s Sloane Square\u2014with affluent clientele including Princess of Wales Kate Middleton\u2019s brother. Hair styling was Golding\u2019s \u201cfirst passion,\u201d but after rounding out his early 20s, he made a big career leap. He packed up his things and moved to Malaysia\u2014where the actor was born\u2014to pursue travel television. Eleven years into his successful travel-host career, Hollywood director John Chu (who directed blockbuster Wicked) found his clips on YouTube<\/a> and recognized his star power for a new project: Crazy Rich Asians, which earned more than $238 million worldwide in box offices. That was his first major studio role, and the rest is history.<\/p>\n Throughout his several professional changes, Golding has lived by one quote he jotted down in passing. It\u2019s a musing on life from renowned 20th century photographer Edward J. Stieglitz: \u201cThe important thing to you is not how many years in your life, but how much life in your years!\u201d Whether it be globetrotting as a TV host for BBC\u2019s The Travel Show or starring in multimillion-dollar box office successes, Golding has stuck with the perspective on living.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really rang true. At the end of it, I just want to be able to tell some crazy stories and have fun anecdotes and tell of the gloriousness of change and possibility,\u201d Golding muses. \u201cSo that\u2019s always been in the back of my mind\u2014it\u2019s kind of helped me navigate and align with.\u201d<\/p>\n Sometimes the best advice comes from complete strangers, and epiphanies are experienced through the most ordinary tasks.<\/p>\n Uber<\/a> was born out of correcting a daily annoyance, which scaled a $203 billion company. It was 2008, and cofounder friends Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp were attending an event in Paris. Once the evening came to a close, they needed a ride home, but they couldn\u2019t manage to hail a taxi. Standing cold in the snowy streets, they daydreamed about the prospect of ordering a car straight from their smartphones. One year later in 2009, the idea was hatched into the business that now has more than 180 million monthly customers.<\/p>\n Nvidia CEO Huang had an intense revelation<\/a> one summer when spending a summer in Japan. One weekend, he and his family visited Kyoto\u2019s Silver Temple, and Huang noticed a gardner diligently tending to the moss under suffocating heat. The man managed the garden with bamboo tweezers. Puzzled by his painstaking care, the tech leader had to ask why.<\/p>\n \u201cI walked up to him and I said, \u2018What are you doing?\u2019\u201d Huang recounted during a commencement speech<\/a> at the California Institute of Technology last year. \u201cHe said, \u2018I\u2019m picking dead moss. I\u2019m taking care of my garden.\u2019 And I said, \u2018But your garden is so big.\u2019 And he responded, \u2018I have cared for my garden for 25 years. I have plenty of time.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt really taught me something,\u201d Huang said. \u201cThis gardener has dedicated himself to his craft and doing his life\u2019s work. And when you do that, you have plenty of time.\u201d<\/p>\nOther unconventional ways leaders have found inspiration<\/h2>\n