Saw this at San Antonio Daily Photo. A sticker on a crosswalk sign. If it's hard to read, it says: "If you can't run with the big dogs keep your ass on the porch." This is the sort of imperative that would immediately prompt me to tell the speaker exactly where he could stick his opinion.Big dogs disease. We're awash in it. It's what makes people give up before they've even tried. If you can't be the best, don't even try is a more accurate rendition of this anti-proverb. Why should I waste my energy working at something if I'll never be the best? Too often we mistake award for achievement. Award is what we receive for being the best. Achievement is what we get for trying, and quite often, failing.
Life will never be perfect. All the little things that make up our lives can't be perfect. The whole point is to work at it, to fail, and to keep working at it.
If you are reading this, and especially if you are a regular reader of this blog, it is likely that you are not a big dog of the blogosphere. I certainly am not. But the achievement is to continue in spite of the fact that you'll never be the best.
Am I saying that everyone has something worth hearing? Of course not. But even crass idiots can serve as an example of how not to be for the rest of us.
Don't let big dogs disease get you down. Because the work itself is an achievement.
I prefer the proverb put to me by a former Drill Seargent Landis,who had me read it from a chalk board on my first day in the Army. It read, " Success is failur". In other words, once you believe you have won, you've accually lost, because you can always improve or make something better. So, never stop trying.
ReplyDelete