Best Hubris is a joint venture with myself, and the parts of my brain which think that they come up with great ideas, wonderful questions whose answers might lead to large scale change or innovation, and pie in the sky pipe dreams which might not be so pie in the sky if I just wrote them down, thought about them for a while and then worked on bringing them to reality.
The truth is that I have all kinds of thoughts all the time. I know, so do you. So does everyone. That’s just the kind of thing that has kept me, until now, from ever bothering to put those ideas out there. After all, I’m just some guy. And that is the thing. Everyone is just some guy. Donald Trump is just some guy. Bill Gates is just some guy. The Wright brothers were just a couple of guys.
There is a great episode of the Simpsons when Springfield has a town meeting to discuss an issue. During the discussion they decide they need someone to lead their efforts. Since, Ned Flanders has been doing the talking, someone shouts out that Ned should be the leader. Ned, being the good never-overstepping, stay-in-line, don’t-stand-out, guy that he is, demurs momentarily with some aw shucks sentiment. During that moment, someone in the crowd shouts out “Someone Else!” Homer stands up and proclaims, “I’m someone else!” to which another member of the crowd replies, “He’s right!” and off they go with Homer as the leader.
It’s a cartoon. I get that. But, in real life, it can be almost as simple. A moment seized is a moment used to its full potential. The question is, “Was it me who seized that moment?” Until now, the answer has been no. That ends today.
I’ve started my own business. It’s a bit of a stretch from where I was previously, but it is still very connected back to my experience and resume, or as I like to call it, my paper quals. But, the fact of the matter is that I’m more than my paper quals say. I have ideas and experiences and things that I’ve noticed that somehow seem to have escaped the attention of everyone else. I’m not saying that I’m a genius, or that everyone must listen to me, but I do have something to say, and I’m going to say it.
Is that foolish? Am I being a chump to assume that people will listen to me? After all, I don’t have a PhD in anything. I’ve never been on Oprah, heck, I’ve never been on T.V. (not entirely true.) So why should people listen to me? Well, my friends, that is where the name comes from. I know that no one may ever listen. I know that I may well be deluding myself into thinking that my ideas and theories are original or worthwhile. The Greeks believed that those who reached highest fell hardest. The civilization that gave us democracy also gave us socialized fear. Try too hard, reach too far, strive to be more than you are, and you will likely end up humbled. They may have been right. Frankly, I don’t care. I’m going out there. I’m going to reach way too far and strive to be more than I’ve ever imagined in my wildest day dreams (and some of them are pretty far fetched.) This site will be my launching pad. The place where I explore and chronicle my ideas and my efforts to bring them to reality. It will be your front-row seat to the birth of ideas and concepts that you may one day see in the isle of a store, or even ideas that revolutionize a whole industry, or if the Universe is in a good mood, maybe even the whole world. It will also be your front-row seat to flame out and eventual burial of those ideas whose time has not come. Either way, I promise the road will be fascinating. I look forward to your company.
Wish me luck.