Vanilla Sky

The sweet will never be as sweet without the sour - Vanilla Sky

Where is Superman?

Quotes from Waiting for Superman, telling the sorry state of US pubic education:

'Why is it that I have a choice of seven different kinds of peanut butter, not even counting the organic brands, and yet kids in my neighborhood don't even have the choice of a single great public school?'

'If in fact we could just eliminate the bottom 6-10% of our teachers and replace them with an average teacher, we could bring the average US student up to the level of Finland, which is at the top of the world today.'

Public education is an example of where market incentives have been misplaced and where the public, more than the politicians, should take leadership into rectifying.

Politics has always(?) been for short-term gains and for securing votes. Education, the effects of which, is measured after generations, will not be an attractive issue for politicians to tackle, much less risk their hides for, unless the public thinking is so.

The public should know that they are the bigger stakeholder in this issue and the least thing they can do is to make it known to their public servants that their vote will depend on how the latter improve public education and be accountable for it.

Success

One of the best ways to define success, from Zenhabits:

'Success isn't about achieving something in the future, but doing something right now that you love.'

Change

I very much like this definition of change from Alan Weber in his Rules of Thumb Book:

Change happens when the cost of the status quo is greater than the risk of change.

In other words, we stick with what we have now, or resist change, until we see or perceive change as something that is better for us. So it all starts with a change in our perception or with our minds before accepting that we have to or need to change.

Clooney on His Success

Found this in an article about George Clooney while traveling:

'I'm lucky enough to have gotten success much later in life.

So I have some understanding how much of it is about luck. A lot of times when you're very young and successful, you think it's all about your brilliance. Then you find out later that it probably isn't. You're never quite as good as they say you are, and you're never quite as bad as they say you are. It's all about enjoying what you do, and I love what I do for a living. I have fun.'