Saturday, December 1, 2018

failure and success

To fail at something you truly admire is better than to succeed at something that can only make you look good.

Is that true? I think perhaps it is.

2 comments:

  1. I think that this scenario needs much more context. Without it, I’d have to not only say that you’re wrong, but that you’re wrong headed.

    While skills may not be transferable, skill acquisition is. Likewise success.

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  2. If by "looking good" you mean being accepted/popular/famous doing something you don't admire, I'd say yes, I rather fail at something I admire.

    Have you seen the film "A Star is Born"? I've never enjoyed Lady Gaga's early music, but got her world-famous. In the film, she goes from an amazing soul-country music artist, with a beautiful performance at the piano (https://youtu.be/5vheNbQlsyU), into famous pop star with dancers and all the artifice but singing very shallow songs.

    In real life, Stefanie (a.k.a. Lady Gaga), appears to be doing the inverse career path. She began singing shallow electropop, wearing outlandish costumes and wigs, which made her as famous as Madonna, but more recently she appears to have toned down into more soul music. A lot of her early fans miss the old Pop Queen, but in my eyes she has moved on from "looking good" into something I admire, from girl artist into a woman. Not so much fun, admittedly, but feels more real, more human, less plastic.

    From (drag?) Queen to Empress, not to say Goddess.

    Before: https://youtu.be/qrO4YZeyl0I
    After: https://youtu.be/en2D_5TzXCA

    She looks great in both, but - musically - I admire the second more (my bias). If you actually see her documentary, it's hard not to feel that while the early piece may show a real facet of Stefanie, who loves to dress up stylishly and be creative, the later feels more natural and real. I admire that.

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