Well Said, Paula Scher
It’s through mistakes that you actually can grow. You have to get bad in order to get good.
— Paula Scher
Paula Scher is an American graphic design icon, partner at Pentagram, and author of one of the first design books I read in college, Make It Bigger. I think my ART203: Graphic Design 1 prof had a crush on her; I recall hearing a lot about her then, and haven’t too much since. You probably recognize her work, though. Great stuff.
Today I’m reflecting on her words above, a truism that applies as much to design as just about any other pursuit in life, and really to life in general. As I’m wont to do, I’ll focus on the latter. Oh, and if it sounds at all like I think I have this all figured out, please. Today especially, I’m writing to myself.
Pruning
Ever plant a garden? (Remind me to tell you about our pots out back — tomatoes on the way!) As I’m learning, one prunes a plant — any plant, not just dried plums — in order to create conditions for growth. That means cutting off parts of the plant, maybe even whole branches, actually improving long-term health prospects. Surely I’m oversimplifying, but hey — cool science and powerful metaphor in one!
Kingdom Math
My friend J.C. is smarter than me. In an email the other week he used the phrase “metrics of the kingdom,” referring to the Kingdom of God, or Heaven, in which “the last will be first and the first will be last.” Classic Christian tomfoolery. South to go north, eh? Addition by subtraction? Well, yeah. The fun nature of a paradox is that it is literally beyond belief and also true.
The Paradox
Here’s what I’m getting at: try to be perfect, avoid mistakes at all costs, and I’m exactly as good as I’ll ever be. It’s counterintuitive, but true. I’ve been there, cruising on autopilot, in design and in life. But I only had to send a couple typo-riddled production files to print before I got a spellcheck system dialed. (If you believe in jinxes, that was one.) Those typographic miscues started a process that made me functionally better, more effective.
What about soft skills, the qualitative ones, like talent? Sometimes they’re transferrable, but I think practicing the same thing over and over mostly makes me good at that thing. To get better at something new, to truly grow, I have to actually do something new. Be bold. Change contexts. Reach. Take even a couple risks and, believe-you-me, I will fail. Tough pill. Also awesome, because I’ve taken the first steps toward improvement. But when I try not to fail, to play it safe, to “be perfect,” well, now I’m guaranteed to fail, only without the mindset geared for growth and with a dose of anxiety and a dash consternation thrown in.
That last bit might sound defeatist and confusing, like I’m advocating failure and also threatening failure as a consequence of not failing. But there’s a wrinkle, and it’s this: seeing the apparent contradiction unravels it. Stop running into waves and you discover surfing. It doesn’t change the core truth; it leverages it. Lewis put it thusly: “Die before you die. There is no chance after.” One might even go so far as to argue there are spiritual applications.
The upshot
All this talk of mistakes and failure and death is about the means, not the end. The goal is growth, new life and, dare I say, redemption. The goal is overwhelmingly positive. In Scher’s words, we only “get bad in order to get good.” We learn from our mistakes. We fail in order to succeed. We die that we might truly live.
Anyway, well said, Paula Scher.
Originally published at www.jaybryantjones.com on June 25, 2015.
