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“The best is the enemy of good.”
Voltaire
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I am sure everyone has either heard of, or read, the book “Good to Great.”
I am not as sure everyone has heard Voltaire’s “the best is the enemy of good.”
Well. Voltaire only beat the book by about 200 years and all while trying not to die in a duel or get his head chopped off.
Two points with this quote.
First is my personal soapbox. Just because something is old doesn’t mean it isn’t smart. I didn’t need an entire book to tell me about good to great. Voltaire said it in one line.
A shitload of people in the past, who never used technology let alone electricity, said a shitload of smart things that are relevant today. One could ask “how the hell could do they do that?” If one asked, I would remind everyone that principles, and principled thinking, are timeless and while past events are contextual, past thinking tends to adapt to context.
Ponder.
Second is the truth behind the thought. You can settle for good or you can do something better. I don’t need a book for that either. What we mostly get wrong in business, and life, is thinking we need to worry about doing ‘bad shit’ or doing something wrong. That is actually the least of our worries. Why? Because for the most part doing bad shit, or doing things wrong, is never satisfying. People, in general, are satisfaction seeking entities. This is where ‘good’ comes into the picture. Good can be quite satisfying. In fact. Good can become addictive if that is all you want. Good can be done in extremely high quantities. But. I would be remiss if I did not point out no matter how many ‘goods’ you do they will never attain the quality of a ‘best.’ I will not suggest everyone should do ‘the best’ or even seek to do ‘the best’ every single time. If we are honest, that is an energy sucking way of life. What I will suggest is that good is so seductive it is the enemy of best.
Yeah. I just flipped the quote.
Yeah. I am pretty sure that is what Voltaire was trying to tell you.
Ponder.