You Need to Care About It
I’m reading a fabulous eBook from the folks at 37 Signals called Getting Real: The smarter, faster, easier way to build a successful web application.
I came across a great quote from Malcolm Gladwell that I simply had to share with you…
You need to care about it
When you write a book, you need to have more than an interesting story. You need to have a desire to tell the story. You need to be personally invested in some way. If you’re going to live with something for two years, three years, the rest of your life, you need to care about it.–Malcolm Gladwell, author (from A Few Thin Slices of Malcolm Gladwell)
I think that applies to whatever project you are involved in: developing a new piece of software, writing a blog, launching a new business, etc.
I’m thinking about printing that out and framing it on my wall…
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Great quote! His “personally involved” statement is for me the same as having a “passion” for a topic.
I think the phrase was “personally invested”, but yes… The quote was from a section dealing with having passion for what you were doing.
They propose that the best way to develop software for which you have passion is to create software that solves your own problems or “scratches your own itch” as another passage says…
Gladwell was just saying the same thing in a different way.
In writing this blog, I need to pay attention when I’m feeling reluctant to write about something… Maybe I’m not “personally invested” in it. Maybe I don’t really care.
I have a heck of a lot more energy to write when I REALLY care about a topic… when it comes from my own life, experiences or problems.
As a teacher, I find that once students fall in love with the subject, they seem to get A’s as a matter of course.