The Bad Side of Being “Good”
3 min read
I recntly started teaching my youngest daughter baseball. Tee-ball, to be exact. We started with the basics. How do you choke up on the bat, stand with your legs shoulder-width apart, and always keep your eye on the ball? Oh, and never, never let go of the bat. It’s been a fun lesson to see how hard it can be to learn something new, especially when every muscle feels impossible to control. But I also noticed something else. Despite never having picked up a baseball bat before this moment, my daughter already wants to be the best.
From a young age, it seems we're constantly pressured to be the best at any given task, from learning to counting and coloring in the lines to eventually being someone’s best friend or best man. This tendency towards being the best and pushing ourselves to peak performance stays with us for most of our lives. I mean, look at characters like Johnny Bravo. The dude is killin' it.
While there's nothing inherently wrong with striving to be the best, I've learned from personal experience that this mindset, if not balanced, can lead to some negative outcomes.
Let me explain.
It feels like just yesterday I was a high schooler tinkering around with Photoshop, clueless about design principles beyond what looked good to me. Over the years, though, I gradually learned and connected the dots, eventually forging a career in design—albeit with a few blunders along the way.
Don’t let the fact that you’re good now, become the reason you turn out bad later.
Since that time, I've worked as a freelance designer, I've worked with marketing teams, I've worked under and with great designers, and even more recently, been able to lead a team of designers. I've had conversations with really great people, even people who I would consider masters of their craft.
On the other hand, I've also encountered people who tend to lean towards the other side of the coin. The people who, while still being great at what they do, stand a little straighter, a little taller because of their accomplishments. The ones who know they're good and want everyone else to know it also.
And through all this, one thing has become increasingly clear — the people who continue to see themselves as a novice, as a life long learner, even if they have 20+ years experience, are the ones that move on to greatness.