John Simon Quotes

I was always ranked last in my class. My problem was that I would obtain a just pass and move on to the next class!

We are far too easily pleased.

If your standards are low, you're going to stop pretty early on in the process.

The biggest human temptation is to settle for too little.

People like to set the bar high. I like to put the bar on the ground and barely step over it. I like to keep the expectations really low.

I think that many Californians have been accustomed to, have normalized, that being good sometimes is good enough.

Good is the enemy of great.

If aught be worse than failure from overstress of a life's prime purpose, it is to sit down content with a little success.

The height of mediocrity is still low.

There are twelve good reasons for failure. The first one is the avowed intention of doing no more than one is paid to do, and the person who makes this avowal may see the other eleven by stepping before a looking glass.

If a person becomes content with what is average, minimally acceptable, or satisfactory, she will rarely exert the effort or work toward something that is truly excellent or outstanding.

But easy's like, who cares? Easy's like, how much is easy going to get you?

We encourage one another in mediocrity.

Good is the enemy of great. And that is one of the key reasons why we have so little that becomes great. We don't have great schools, principally because we have good schools. We don't have great government, principally because we have good government. Few people attain great lives, in large part because it is just so easy to settle for a good life.

To be mediocre, when only application and diligence would have netted superiority, is an error akin to sin.

Average is Your Enemy.

Good is the enemy of great. And that's one of the key reasons why we have so little that becomes great.

Don't do anything that you're already not great at doing.

If there's one thing I learned from Rodrick, it's to set people's expectations real low so you end up surprising them by practically doing nothing at all.

For many of us the great danger is not that we will renounce our faith. It is that we will become so distracted and rushed and preoccupied that we will settle for a mediocre version of it.

People talk to you and they try to convince you that they like what they do just because it sucks less than what they used to do... which sucked a lot.

I have my standards. They're low, but I have them.

If not excellence, what? If not excellence now, when?

Ninety-nine percent of people believe they can't do great things, so they aim for mediocrity.

It is so much easier to live placidly and complacently. Of course, to live placidly and complacently is not to live at all.