The title of this entry is not a typo, but a restatement of an idea from G. K. Chesterton. He said, “anything worth doing is worth doing badly." He (and I) aren’t suggesting you set out to fail at life. No, the idea here is to free yourself from the tyranny of failure. And you might remember some of this logic from my earlier post Fuck up, but don’t be a fuck-up. Maybe I’m repeating myself, but one, I’m pretty sure that’s what parents do, two, this is a different twist on that idea, and three, let’s see you come up with a completely original piece of advice every week for a year without repeating yourself.
The G.K. Chesterton society wrote “Chesterton’s advice is not an excuse for poor efforts. It is perhaps an excuse for poor results. But our society is plagued by wanting good results with no efforts (or rather, with someone else’s efforts). We hire someone else to work for us, to play for us (that is, to entertain us), to think for us, and to raise our children for us. We have left ‘the things worth doing’ to others, on the poor excuse that others might be able to do them better.”
And while that’s a great message, my take on this concept is slightly different. While you should not set out to fail, what if fear of failure keeps you from setting out at all? While “anything worth doing is worth doing well” is an admirable aspiration, do you really have the time and energy to do everything well? <Spoiler alert> No. You don’t.
For example, let’s say you want to get swole, but don’t have time to lift for two hours every day. You could tell yourself that you’ll never be able to get “24-inch pythons” like Hulk Hogan and never start lifting weights. “Why bother, if I can’t do it well?” you might say. Or, instead of getting caught up in the idea of creating the perfect exercise plan, you might find a way to lift for 20-30 minutes a couple times a week. And while that won’t get you front row tickets to the gun show, it’s better than nothing.
Sometimes, nothing is the alternative, and doing something wrong is often better than not doing it at all. Not always, mind you. You wouldn’t pick a heart surgeon, an auto mechanic, or an airline pilot who just wants to do their best, even if it’s not quite up to standards. These somethings have life and death consequences for being done badly. So, if doing it wrong would mean killing hundreds of people, or even killing one people, you can tell me and Chesterton to kiss your ass.
But, if doing it wrong means you don’t achieve the ideal result, but you’ll get a better result than doing nothing? Go right ahead and do it wrong. See sex, pizza, and dancing with a pretty girl. Even done badly, they’re still pretty damn good.
But sometimes, doing it wrong leads to doing it right. And if you’re so afraid of failure that you never try, you’ll never give yourself the chance to get there.
Please note that this advice does not apply to mowing our lawn. That is a thing that must be done, and done well. When the time comes for you to take on that task, rest assured that I, (just like my Dad did for me), will help ensure you do it well.
Let’s go back to Chesterton. He later quoted his own advice in “When Doctors Agree” in the collection, The Paradoxes of Mr. Pond (1937). “...In defense of hobbies and amateurs and general duffers like himself: ‘If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.’”
Before you become an expert at anything, you must be an amateur. You know who generally does things badly? Amateurs. We bumble, fumble and fail, learning as we go. A few of us go on to master skills like playing an instrument, a sport, or smoking brisket. Most of us continue to suck, and find that even if the brisket is a little overcooked, it’s still brisket, which even in its inferior forms, is still damn delicious.
So, what if you don’t have time to apprentice under pit masters who’ve smoked hundreds of thousands of briskets over multiple decades? I didn’t. I had enough time to watch some videos and read some articles. And while I’ll never be a barbecue pitmaster or open my own restaurant, I will be full of brisket, whenever the hell I want it.
Okay, so if you’re on board, how do you enjoy doing something badly? Learn to enjoy the doing as much as the result. Sounds easy, yeah? It’s not. Our default is to focus on the end of a task, of what it produces. But if you focus on the task itself, you’ll find you can enjoy the doing, but you can enjoy it even if the result isn’t perfect. Back to the brisket: it’s a time-consuming process, but includes being outside, drinking cold beer, and enjoying the smell of smoking meat. The process is no brisket sandwich, but it’s a damn good time.
Here’s the sneaky gold nugget hidden in this pile of “go and do things badly”: If you’re going to excel at anything, you’ll need to practice. (Unless you’re Alan Iverson) If you love the doing, not just the state of having done, you’ll look forward to practice. And that energy and enthusiasm will help you improve your skills. Whether it’s cooking a brisket or riding a bike, practice makes you better. Add practice to doing something badly, and eventually, you’ll do it better and better until someday, you’ll find you’re doing it well, or at the very least, not so badly.
I wish for you the courage to go and try all the things you want to try, to stretch yourself without the fear of failing, and the self-confidence to try and try again, even when you do things badly. The world offers you an unbelievable amount of things to try and do, so don’t let a fear of doing things badly stop you from doing them all.
I love you,
Dad
I originally planned to finish this series in twelve months, intending to write one entry a week for 52 weeks. But, other things came up and I didn’t have as much time as I thought I would. We moved, you started a new school, I had other projects, etc. But finally, I’m starting my last entry in September, nine months after I’d planned. Which is the perfect intro to this one.
Time is funny like that. It marches on like a metronome, indifferent to how much you wish it would slow down or speed up. It offers no do-overs, no matter how frivolously you spend it. And it gives zero fucks what you planned to accomplish in the time you had. Once that time is over, you’ll get no more. But, it also stretches out ahead of you into an unknown future, offering untold possibility and infinite choices.
Which is why I hope you both learn to make choices about how you spend your time and understand what those choices mean. Because while there’s never enough time for everything, there’s still enough time to do almost anything.