You HAVE to be Wrong

In order to do anything great in this world, you have to be wrong.

I don’t mean actually wrong, but I mean that others will tell you you’re wrong, and you have to be okay with that.

Otherwise if you only follow advice based on what most people think is right, you’ll generally get average results.

Society and the people in it tend to be a regulating force, pushing behavior towards the mean. Society doesn’t want outliers. If everyone was an outlier and didn’t follow social norms, society would break down.

But outliers are also what accomplish amazing things. They’re what create progress. The rest just ensure that the status quo continues.

So when you come up with a truly amazing idea, something that isn’t just a small, obvious improvement, but a major leap forward, you have to expect people to tell you it’s a bad idea. They’ll tell you all the reasons why it won’t work and why you should give it up.

Do it anyway.

Because entrepreneurs don’t care about what other people think.

(Actually, that’s not exactly true. I think entrepreneurs care a lot what people think about them. They’re just willing to be called wrong in the short-run in order to be validated as right in the long run and get a lot of respect or prestige for being that ONE person who was right.)

So if you can’t handle being wrong, you’re unlikely to accomplish anything truly amazing, at least not on purpose. Tell me if you disagree in the comments.