Chapter 1: What is the purpose of the Scott Adams Celebration of Life?
Afternoon, I'm Greg Gutfeld. I'm lucky to be a friend of Scott Adams. We're here to celebrate the life of Scott Adams, which is incredibly easy to do. Anybody who knows him has been touched by his life and your life has been made better by Scott Adams. Although this is the first day I found out his middle name was Raymond. I don't know how to feel about that.
I'm more upset that he never told me his middle name was Raymond. I have so much to talk about Scott, but I'm speaking later and I don't want to just shoot my load right here. Probably not a good adjective to use, but it is amazing how prepared I am to talk about Scott because Scott gave me the tools to talk about life and people and friendship that I wouldn't have been able to do before.
extremely grateful to be here and to see all of you. I'm incredibly grateful for the life that I have and my family and my job. I'm grateful for those things. And a lot of those things came because of my friendship with Scott. So ultimately, beneath my gratitude for my life is my eternal gratitude for knowing Scott. But I'll get into that later. Right now I want to introduce the legendary
Just an amazing person, Shelly Adams, who will do her welcome remarks. Thanks.
I want to thank everyone for being here and for those joining us in livestream. In Scott's last few months, he would say to me, I really didn't know until now how many lives I've impacted. I am so grateful that I got the opportunity to see it. I wish I had a little bit more time, but I've done my job.
I'm ready, and now my wish is to keep my legacy alive by those I impacted, passing my lessons along to others. I do believe Scott is watching over us right now and continuing to see how his presence shaped many of our lives and the impact he made on this world. With that, I have a special video that I'd like to share with you.
The world lost a great one this month when we lost Scott Adams. There was nobody like him. But having gained a good heart, a brilliant mind, and a very brave soul, That's the big game for heaven. Scott was one of a kind among the most interesting and original people and thinkers of our time.
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Chapter 2: How did Scott Adams impact the lives of those who knew him?
His wit, humor, talent, kindness, and insights on life endeared him to millions and millions of people and taught his many fans, readers, and listeners how to look at the world in a very different way. He was a very different guy, but brilliant. I will never forget that Scott was with me from the very beginning right at the very beginning. He knew what was happening. He got it.
And he was a loyal and true friend to all of us until the very end. After I heard Scott was sick, I called him up and asked him if there was anything at all I could do to help. And as I was reminded then, Scott was a courageous and relentlessly positive guy. Over these past few months, he endured pain and faced death with extraordinary spirit and grace and
talent because he was in there pitching his talent would always come through no matter how sick he was scott we love you we miss you and we will never ever forget you thank you for everything and everything you've done for me and god bless the united states of america which loves you so much thank you very much scott
That was so Trump. All right, our next speaker is one of Scott's friends and a great writer, Joel Pollack. Today we mourn our beloved Scott Adams. Yet we also celebrate his extraordinary life. In a few moments, I'm going to share some of the best news some of us have ever heard. But first, my name is Joel Pollack, and I'm a journalist.
I became close with Scott Adams over the last 10 years, and he asked me to write his biography. Scott was the creator of Dilbert and the author of books like How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big, and the host of Coffee with Scott Adams. He introduced an awareness of persuasion in politics. He was also a husband, a stepfather, and a brother.
And many of us felt he was also our best friend. So many of us traveled across the country despite the snowstorm to be here. And so many thousands more are watching online and millions will watch in the days that follow. With us today in spirit are Dilbert, Wally, Alice, and so many more characters.
The pointy-haired boss sent flowers, and the Republic of Elbonia declared a national day of mourning. Dogbert sends regrets. He couldn't get back in time from the Davos summit in Switzerland. Scott was born on June 8th, 1957, the second child of Virginia and Paul Adams.
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Chapter 3: What personal anecdotes highlight Scott's character and contributions?
From an early age, Scott had a vision of what his life would become. His mother used to say Scott would be president. He replied that he preferred to be the power behind the president. Looking back at the past decade, it's clear he achieved that. President Donald Trump called Scott the great influencer, and he should know.
Scott predicted Trump would win way back in 2015, and he helped many people understand Trump. Scott debunked hoaxes about Trump, and he offered ideas about how Trump could govern. And the White House was listening. In 2017, when North Korea's Kim Jong Un threatened America with ballistic missiles, Scott had a suggestion. Why not reach out to him?
The idea made its way to the White House, and Trump gave it a try. The result was calm on the Korean peninsula and peace over the Pacific. You can see from the president's heartfelt tribute just how deeply he respected and loved Scott. That message, by the way, was delivered thanks to a special effort by Greg Gottfeld and Jared Kushner and Dan Scavino. Their generosity reflects Scott's own.
I was one of the many fans who reached out to Scott for advice and whom he helped. In 2016, I interviewed him and we became friends. Over the years, I confided in Scott and he in me. On the day he was canceled by the media, I came over and I told him we would always be with him. we would always be on his side. And you know, we didn't agree on everything. That was the point.
Scott would admire the skill with which someone presented their view, even if he disagreed with it. That gave him intellectual freedom and moral clarity. Scott was generous long before he had the means to help other people. Scott's sister, Cindy, told me that when her first husband left her alone and pregnant in Boston, she found herself in a financial bind.
Scott called her from San Francisco, where he had just started working at a bank. He had no money, but he offered to help anyway. Together they brainstormed possible solutions, including Scott's idea of helping her start her own daycare. Though she ended up taking a different path, that moral support and offer of financial support meant everything to her.
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Chapter 4: What lessons did Scott Adams teach about life and success?
Scott was also a fighter. He stood up for free speech and for truth. Scott often defended Trump, but he was an independent thinker, and he often had a contrary view. For example, you may remember Stormy Daniels, the adult film actress who turned against Trump. When she was arrested in Ohio for public indecency, many Trump supporters were happy. But Scott said Stormy Daniels was probably innocent.
Police reported that Stormy had battered a patron at a strip club with her bare breasts. Scott said that sounded like a good time. Scott used humor to diffuse our anxieties about politics when many of us felt hounded or yes, hunted because of our views. He created a character called Dale with a tissue paper goatee as the symbol of elitism and snark. We laughed at Dale and we set our fears aside.
We also cried with Scott as he endured the death of his stepson. That loss motivated Scott to push our political leaders to fight the threat of fentanyl. It's not a coincidence that fentanyl deaths are way down today. That's great news, but the best news is still coming.
Over the years, Scott shared dozens of lessons through his books and live streams, using systems instead of goals, building a talent stack. These were lessons he had absorbed across his lifetime. Take the talent stack, for example, the idea of collecting skills that add up to more than the sum of their parts.
Growing up in Windham in upstate New York, Scott, Cindy, and their older brother, Dave, had watched their father teach himself many different skills, including how to build his own swimming pool and how to invest in the stock market. I asked Scott whether he had drawn some of his ideas from the Bible, even if he himself wasn't yet religious.
He said no, that principles like turn the other cheek had universal relevance. But when Scott began to embrace Christianity, even though I'm Jewish, I shared a passage from the New Testament with him, from Matthew 25, verses 14 to 30, the parable of the talents. A talent is a coin, but the word has many meanings.
In the story, Jesus rebukes a servant who buries his talent to keep it safe and rewards the servants who multiply their talents by taking them into the market and investing them. That lesson resonates with Scott's own. Scott wrote that the story of Jonah and the whale had turned him into a skeptic of religion as a child. How could a man survive inside a whale for three days?
I wonder if what really bothered Scott wasn't the whale, but that Jonah ran away from his mission. He didn't want to use his talents to help others. Jonah was the critic who wanted to sit on the sidelines to see everything destroyed so he could be proven right.
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Chapter 5: How did Scott Adams influence political discourse?
Scott's message was the opposite. Make the most of your talents. Don't be afraid to be embarrassed or to be wrong. Be useful. And be happy when your enemies do the right thing. One of my favorite lessons was what Scott called the 48 hour rule. When someone said something crazy or offensive, social media would explode, but Scott would give them 48 hours to walk it back or to explain.
It was a way of restoring decency, of healing. Maybe we should all commit to keeping the 48 hour rule alive. Scott was also relentlessly positive. He told us that as tough as the news might be on any given morning, we have to remember we are living in a golden age. That was good news, but the best news is still coming. Scott taught us how to reframe difficult situations.
He reframed cancellation as liberation, and he found a way to thrive outside the mainstream media. He went through two divorces, but in his last days, as he looked back, he told me he had enjoyed what he called two complete marriages. They had not failed, they had been fulfilled. What a reframe.
And of course, Shelley remained his best friend, his assistant, and his caregiver through the hardest times. Thank you for everything, Shelley. Scott spent his last months helping everyone he could. He helped his stepdaughter celebrate her wedding. He offered to help me and others when we were displaced by the Palisades fire.
When Scott asked me to speak at his funeral, I told him that I would offer another reframe, from grief to gratitude. We miss Scott, but we are so thankful for the life that he lived. We will remember him every day at 10 a.m. Eastern, 7 Pacific. He gave us the simultaneous sip. During the pandemic, he gave us the simultaneous swaddle. He kept his live stream going to his last day.
Scott became successful through Dilbert, but he believed his legacy would be what he taught people about how to understand the world and improve their lives.
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Chapter 6: What were Scott's views on creativity and personal development?
Let me try to summarize his philosophy. Scott believed we could never know what was real. We all see the world through a filter. That doesn't mean everything is relative. Some filters help us achieve more than others. The crucial thing is that we can choose our filters and become authors of our own reality.
For example, Scott applied what he called the Dilbert filter to understand the chaos of large organizations. He used the persuasion filter to understand politics and to shape events. Some say that without Scott, the last election would have been very different. Many of us would still be censored today. Scott gave us our voices back. He changed that reality.
Of course, the physical world still exists. You might say, what good is a filter against something like cancer? But look around us. Have you ever seen anyone leave this world surrounded by so much love? By facing death in the public way he did, Scott became even closer to the people who loved him. Scott reframed death as not just a physical separation, but also an opportunity for connection.
He told me after he could no longer walk that in some ways it was the worst time of his life, but in many ways it was also the best. Two days before he died, I sent Scott a photo of the first page of his biography. His last words to me were, and so it begins. Good luck, my friend. Even in the end, Scott saw a beginning. God embraced Christianity in his last days.
He promised his followers he would do it. In fact, he had done it already, privately. It was the one thing he had kept to himself. He reasoned that if he was wrong, no loss. If he reached heaven, he would know he had been right. Now, finally, for the best news some of us have ever heard, are you ready?
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Chapter 7: How did Scott Adams approach relationships and friendships?
The morning after he died, one of his friends, who is not religious, sent me a note. Joel, he wrote, I woke up this morning with a three-word phrase in my head. Incredibly good news. Just the phrase. And no linkage to Scott until I asked myself, incredible good news about what? And then I tried to dismiss it, but I couldn't. I didn't really ask for any messages, but this one arrived.
Incredibly good news. What does that mean? As Scott said, we each understand news through our own filters. But if you have a certain filter, call it the salvation filter, what I just told you may be the best news you have ever heard. Is it real? Was it Scott? I can't tell you.
What I can tell you is how beautiful it is that millions of people who love Scott can look forward to having coffee with him again. For now, we can pass along Scott's lessons to the people we will one day leave behind to keep him alive in this world as well. So it begins. Good luck, my friend. Thanks Joel, that was amazing. Up next, the great Shelly Adams.
Before I begin, I want to call out my husband, Pat. who has known from the beginning of our 11 year relationship that I'm a package deal. Not only did I come with two children, but I also came with an ex-husband who would be forever in my life.
Not your typical blended family, but I appreciate Pat's understanding, love, support through the years, as well as giving up our time while taking care of Scott until the end. At I know you've heard a lot you've had to endear a lot about Scott, especially in the last past year, but here I go again, you might want to pull out those earplugs that I slipped into your pocket earlier today.
i'm so unbelievably grateful to have Scott in my life for the last 24 years. Scott was public about almost everything, but when it came to his family, he was a protector. I'll try to do my best to give you the short story of how Scott came into my life and save the long, juicy version for Scott's biography. You're welcome, Joel.
I met Scott in 2022 at a local gym when I was working part time, taking care, taking a break from my career to raise two young children.
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Chapter 8: What is Scott's legacy and how will it be remembered?
As you all know, Scott always had a routine. He had a regular standing tennis date with his friend, John. which happened to be during the time I worked. Scott was so easy to talk to, instantly became friends, but embarrassingly, for several months, I didn't know what he did for a living, nor did I know much about the Dilbert cartoon until he decided to share that with me.
All I knew is that he was funny, smart, kind, uplifting, positive, very fit. One year later, in 2003, it was time for me to go back to full-time work. And Scott happened to mention he was looking to hire an administrative assistant. With the ability to work from home, it was the perfect opportunity for me.
With my children only being three and five years old at the time, my main job was just collecting some great comic strip ideas from people's real work stories, along with other projects he had me do.
2024 Scott asked me out for dinner with his tennis buddy John and his wife Lorraine I didn't think much of it as I considered John my friend and why was Scott a very successful man have any interest in a single divorced mom with two young children who was his employee Well, little did I know, he didn't see things that way. He saw qualities in me that he didn't see in myself.
And to him, I was the family he always wanted. Our relationship grew, and the big test was when it was time to meet the kids, who were only four and six at the time. What I didn't know then is that Scott merely Scott didn't merely want he decided that we were going to be his family. We all know when Scott decides something he'll do whatever it takes to make it happen.
It wasn't going to be easy trying to win over two shy stubborn kids who didn't understand why Scott was coming into their lives. Scott not having been around children much, this was definitely going to be one of his biggest challenges. My daughter, Savannah, recalls her first introduction to Scott.
When we were invited over, Scott pulled out some off-brand soda, some really awful version of like Sprite or Canada Dry. She can't really remember what it was, but she wasn't too happy or impressed. For my son, Justin, he was younger and a little more impressed by Scott's jokes and of course his magic tricks.
Scott quickly learned how difficult it was to entertain kids as well as how hard it was going to be for them to adapt to the new situation. Scott was not gonna give up because remember, he decided that we were going to be his family. Of course, Scott succeeded as he did with almost everything he decided to do. He researched, he learned, he used his persuasion techniques to win the kids over.
We married in 2006 and became a family, and that forever changed our lives. He was a Scot. You all know and love accepted us for who we were while making us better versions of ourselves, he was a devoted husband and stepdad who showed up in so many ways he surprised us one day with having our family picture painted in a mural.
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