Here we begin frank speculation. And since we are speculating, we'll use those powerful pseudo-laws, the Principles of Mediocrity and Minimal Assumption.
Vernor VingeTags: assumptions mediocrity speculation
Only the mediocre artist is always at his best.
Victor J. BanisTags: art writing artist writer excellence mediocrity
Brockhurst, the champion of individualism, was soon launched on his favorite topic.
"The great fault of the American nation, which is the fault of republics, is the reduction of everything to the average. Our universities are simply the expression of the forces that are operating outside. We are business colleges purely and simply, because we as a nation have only one ideal—the business ideal."
"That's a big statement," said Regan.
"It's true. Twenty years ago we had the ideal of the lawyer, of the doctor, of the statesman, of the gentleman, of the man of letters, of the soldier. Now the lawyer is simply a supernumerary enlisting under any banner for pay; the doctor is overshadowed by the specialist with his business development of the possibilities of the rich; we have politicians, and politics are deemed impossible for a gentleman; the gentleman cultured, simple, hospitable, and kind, is of the dying generation; the soldier is simply on parade."
"Wow!" said Ricketts, jingling his chips. "They're off."
"Everything has conformed to business, everything has been made to pay. Art is now a respectable career—to whom? To the business man. Why? Because a profession that is paid $3,000 to $5,000 a portrait is no longer an art, but a blamed good business. The man who cooks up his novel according to the weakness of his public sells a hundred thousand copies. Dime novel? No; published by our most conservative publishers—one of our leading citizens. He has found out that scribbling is a new field of business. He has convinced the business man. He has made it pay.
Tags: college business mediocrity yale selling-out 1912 brockhurst
Apathetic people sit back and wait for things to get better before they move. Radical people make things get better, by how they move.
Shannon L. AlderTags: success inspiration apathy action mediocrity passiveness
Mediocrity is Death.
Suleman AbdullahTags: inspirational passion work ideas life-lessons artist mediocrity brands creative-profession
Beauty he loved for its own sake; ugliness, which more often than not was a form of inverted beauty, fascinated him. Life offered far too little of either, and far too much appalling mediocrity, which he thought hideous.
Lloyd Biggle Jr.Tags: life beauty ugly mediocrity ugliness
Most humans, in varying degrees, are already dead. In one way or another they have lost their dreams, their ambitions, their desire for a better life. They have surrendered their fight for self-esteem and they have compromised their great potential. They have settled for a life of mediocrity, days of despair and nights of tears. They are no more than living deaths confined to cemeteries of their choice. Yet they need not remain in that state. They can be resurrected from their sorry condition. They can each perform the greatest miracle in the world. They can each come back from the dead...
Og MandinoTags: choice miracle choices potential mediocrity settle potential-for-greatness settle-for-less
We like to stress the commonness of heroes. Essences seem undemocratic. We feel oppressed by the call to greatness. We regard an interest in glory or perfection as a sign of mental unhealthiness, and have decided that high achievers, who are called overachievers, owe their surplus ambition to a defect in mothering (either too little or too much). We want to admire but think we have a right not to be intimidated. We dislike feeling inferior to an ideal. So away with ideals, with essences. The only ideals allowed are healthy ones -- those everyone may aspire to, or comfortably imagine oneself possessing.
Susan SontagTags: success greatness equality democracy ambition jealousy ideals heroes essence glory achievement perfection mediocrity intimidation inferiority pettiness egalitarianism overachievers
Mediocrity is always in a rush; but whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing with consideration. For genius is nothing more nor less than doing well what anyone can do badly.
Amelia E. BarrTags: work genius speed mediocrity
You will always feel insignificant if you never do anything to change the world or another person's life, other than your own.
Shannon L. AlderTags: apathy mediocrity insignificance accomplishments
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