Dogma and change fatigue

Many people have described me as an idealist. I have also recognised a certain evangelical streak in myself. Combine this with the values described by the phrases above and you have a recipe for Quixotic enterprise. This idea of using the right tool for the right job seems quite simple, but there’s a hidden catch: what is the right tool? What is the right way to do something? When you really hold on to the dogma of “Do stuff right using the right tools” you are setting yourself up for a lot of pain. You start searching for better tools (to make sure you’re using the “right” one), you start searching for better ways of doing things (to make sure you’re doing it “right”) and you eagerly evangelise the latest thing you’ve learned as the answer to these questions.

Of course, somewhere in the back of my mind I know the whole idea is bogus. I guess I was a bit happier when I knew less methods of doing things. Not because I was less enamoured of the dogma above, but because I was more convinced I was doing things right. Looking back, I find myself thinking I was doing things all wrong. So how was I able to be so productive? Because the dogma is wrong, or at least wrong when you interpret “right” as “best”. The idea that there is only one right answer to vague questions like this is of course pretty immature. I am learning now how coupled the idea of “right” is to what you know, your skill level and the greater community. Perhaps I should try and focus on getting stuff done using what I have, and looking at projects that have actually delivered results for me, that’s pretty much what I had to do.

But this brings me to the change fatigue part of the title. Once you realise that you should be freeing yourself from dogmatic adherence to infantile rules, you start searching around for better rules, right? Hang on – now we’re back to the same problem, and we add a new one – change fatigue. Doing things in one way creates baggage. It affects the way you think and it creates artifacts built using those methods. It represents an investment. All of this means it is hard to change on so many levels that you may find yourself experiencing change fatigue – that feeling of unfamiliarity which drains your will to do things and makes you less productive. This is what I am experiencing now.

I should have a poster made, I think, with “Le mieux est l’ennemi du bien” (the best is the enemy of the good) printed on it. Or perhaps I should find a way to let go of dogma altogether and just get things done. After all, aphorisms may be pleasing but Voltaire also said “Un bon mot ne prouve rien” (a witty saying proves nothing).