Quotes About Mediocrity

Some people are born mediocre, some people achieve mediocrity, and some people have mediocrity thrust upon them.

We are in danger of developing a cult of the Common Man, which means a cult of mediocrity.

I don't think there's any problem with technology. Actually rewind that thought - there is a downside to affordable technology, and that's mediocrity. I mean just 'cause you can afford it don't mean you can do it.

Mediocrity inspires neither great love nor hate.

Goodness is weakness, pleasantness is poisonous, serenity is mediocrity and kindness is for losers. The best reason for committing loathsome and detestable acts – and let’s face it, I am considered something of an expert in this field – is purely for their own sake. Monetary gain is all very well, but it dilutes the taste of wickedness to a lower level that is obtainable by almost anyone with an overdeveloped sense of avarice. True and baseless evil is as rare as the purest good.

Some of you may be perfectly happy with mediocrity. Some of you will get nothing but heartbreak. Some of you will be heralded as geniuses and become huge. Of course, all of you think that one describes you...hence the delusion necessary to push on.

Mix sheer hypocrisy with mediocrity, You play it safe every time.

The culture has got to be only the best for Collingwood. I reckon Collingwood accepts defeat far too easily and accepts mediocrity far too easily.

The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity, since the tastes, knowledge, and principles of the majority form the tribunal of appeal.

Sir, the slowness of genius is hard to bear, but the slowness of mediocrity is insufferable.

Be the best, but get ready to be attacked. Only mediocrity is safe.

Any corporate policy and plan which is typical of the industry is doomed to mediocrity. Where this is not so, it should be possible to demonstrate that all other competitors are at a distinct disadvantage.

The natural tendency of representative government, as of modern civilisation, is towards collective mediocrity: and this tendency is increased by all reductions and extensions of the franchise, their effect being to place the principal power in the hands of classes more and more below the highest level of instruction in the community.

My biggest concern is that America is drifting towards mediocrity and that people don't recognize - and by people I'm meaning Washington - don't recognize the sense of urgency and the fact that I don't think this is a crisis anymore. I think it's an emergency.

The bar is so low in rap - mediocrity is king!

Caricature is the tribute which mediocrity pays to genius.

Being realistic is the quickest path to mediocrity

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.

But when we get enough people who don't care, and who don't accept personal responsibility for high ethical standards, our organization gets the "M" disease. Mediocrity. Anybody in the place can be a carrier. By the same token, every individual can carry the cure: the ethics of excellence.

When we are placed in a set of circumstances where we have to take initiative and be creative, some of us find it hard to transition. Those people have been trained not to think but to obey orders. They are slaves to the training, unconsciously pledging allegiance to the average. Mentally they recite from the manual of mediocrity.

Mediocrity is beneath a brave soul.

There is no greatness apart from self control. Development that does not include self government will only guarantee our mediocrity.

When small men attempt great enterprises, they always end by reducing them to the level of their mediocrity.

Dividing meager resources across a host of medium term operational goals creates mediocrity on a broad scale.

The mediocrity of everything in the great world of today is simply appalling. We live in intellectual slums.

You gotta fight every day to keep mediocrity at bay.

The signature of mediocrity is chronic inconsistency.

Solitude, the safeguard of mediocrity, is to genius the stern friend

I have a deathly fear of mediocrity and that nips at my heels and gets me into a lot of trouble.

I think there is probably no better person to aspire to emulate than Steve Jobs and what he has done at Apple in terms of his leadership, his innovation, not settling for mediocrity.

Trying to get everyone to like you is a sign of mediocrity.

Will I allow my fear to bind me to mediocrity?

A talent somewhat above mediocrity, shrewd and not too sensitive, is more likely to rise in the world than genius.

Focus on competition has always been a formula for mediocrity.

We will meet our challenges head on and we will do it by rejecting the politics of mediocrity and corruption. You voted for change; I intend to deliver it. ... I will govern as a reformer.

There are two extremes to be avoided: one is the attitude of contempt toward education, the other is the tragic snobbery of assuming that marching through an educational system is a sure cure for ignorance and mediocrity.

Virtue is defined to be mediocrity, of which either extreme is vice.

It is puzzling to me that otherwise sensitive people develop a real docility about the obvious necessity of eating, at least once a day, in order to stay alive. Often they lose their primal enjoyment of flavors and odors and textures to the point of complete unawareness. And if ever they question this progressive numbing-off, they shrug helplessly in the face of mediocrity everywhere. Bit by bit, hour by hour, they say, we are being forced to accept the not-so-good as the best, since there is little that is even good to compare it with.

Among many parallels which men of imagination have drawn between the natural and moral state of the world, it has been observed that happiness as well as virtue consists in mediocrity.

No wonder we are all more or less pleased with mediocrity, since it leaves us at rest, and gives the same comfortable feeling as when one associates with his equals.

Imitation is the homage mediocrity pays to greatness.

I'm prepared to concede that stupidity does not help survival. One must after all understand not to poke a tiger with a stick. But intelligence leads to curiosity, and curiosity has never been a quality that helps one pour his or her genes into the pool. The truth must lie somewhere between. Whatever the reason, it is clearly mediocrity, at best, that lives and breeds.

Low standards are a tactic that takes pressure off teachers unions by accepting mediocrity and failure for kids.

Complacency is the forerunner of mediocrity. You can never work too hard on attitudes, effort and technique.

...I am afraid that education is conceived more in terms of indoctrination by most school officials than in terms of enlightenment. My own belief is that education must be subversive if it is to be meaningful. By this I mean that it must challenge all the things we take for granted, examine all accepted assumptions, tamper with every sacred cow, and instill a desire to question and doubt. Without this the mere instruction to memorise data is empty. The attempt to enforce conventional mediocrity on the young is criminal.

I think Nigerians got it wrong from independence as people became so conscious of the divisions because we wanted so much to satisfy the plurality of interests. I will say, we neglected the importance of real value, human value and the quality of potential in human beings and we contrived phrases like geographical spread, regional quota, etc and allowed mediocrity to reign. I think that is the problem that we are dealing with till today.

Rules are foolish, arbitrary, mindless things that raise you quickly to a level of acceptable mediocrity, then prevent you from progressing further.