A bit of wisdom.

[IpseLux]

As a student of philosophy and of art, I want to share something with you all, particularly the youth.
A great lesson in life is this: there are no, or at best very few perfections in life. Right?
But being is a perfection. Something cannot half be, and half not be. Something is. And in being it shares in that perfection.
I say this, because creating a work is that. More than half of it. And once created it is perfect in that it is.
I’m not speaking of being this or that, but in existing. Create. Make. It needs not be good, bad or great. It will be. And in that there is a perfection.
Knowing photography is not being a photographer.
Photography is an art.
Photograph.
Best of luck to you all.
Kind regards!

 

[Vaughn]

At some point I say "It's good enough" and frame it.

Some see that as an admission of failure to push it further.

I see it as a marker of lessons learned, of gains made, and of potentiality.

 

[Sirius Glass]

At some point I say "It's good enough" and frame it.

Some see that as an admission of failure to push it further.

I see it as a marker of lessons learned, of gains made, and of potentiality.

I agree. Sometimes striving for too much perfection is a WOMBAT ==> Waste Of Money, Brains And Time.

 

[cliveh]

Read Zen in the Art of Archery by German philosophy professor Eugen Herrigel

 

[Vaughn]

Read Zen in the Art of Archery by German philosophy professor Eugen Herrigel

It is on my shelf, along with Allen Watts and the two Suzukis. Some Chadwick and Humphreys, some Chuang Tzu (Thomas Merton's translations are delightful) and a bunch of other stuff...including Herman Hesse's take on it.

At one point I realized I know way too much about Zen to ever gain enlightenment by knowing about it, so I stopped worrying about more factual knowledge on the subject.

The best scrap of wisdom I got from the Autobiography of a Yogi is that if one wears shoes, the earth is covered with shoe leather.

 

[Chuck1]

Pirsig's take is good too

 

[loccdor]

Letting go of perfectionism was an essential step in my path.

 

[Patrick Robert James]

Maybe it was Picasso that said the most important part is knowing when to stop.

 

[stevenje]

"Have no fear of perfection, you will never reach it." - Salvador Dali​

 

[Don_ih]

But being is a perfection.

No it isn't.

Anyway, very few people are hung up on perfection. It tends to prevent things from getting done.

 

[JensH]

Pirsig's take is good too

... learned about the essence of quality there.
We read this in school when I was 18.

 

[MartinCrabtree]

Chasing the unobtainable is a fools game. Took me decades to accept that.

 

[pentaxuser]

The best scrap of wisdom I got from the Autobiography of a Yogi is that if one wears shoes, the earth is covered with shoe leather.

I take it that the particular Yogi in question said this for a comical quip?. I can see a Python in the Quest for the Holy Grail saying something like this. It sounds a bit like the advice to "Grasshopper " about walking across rice paper without leaving any marks

pentaxuser

 

[pentaxuser]

No it isn't.

Anyway, very few people are hung up on perfection. It tends to prevent things from getting done.

Well some people believe that getting things done always results in perfection in both execution and outcome

pentaxuser

 

[Vaughn]

I take it that the particular Yogi in question said this for a comical quip?. I can see a Python in the Quest for the Holy Grail saying something like this. It sounds a bit like the advice to "Grasshopper " about walking across rice paper without leaving any marks

pentaxuser

No, it was the answer he gave to a gentleman when asked why he and his companion (they were upper middle class, I believe) were traveling around India barefooted. On a little deeper level, the shoe thing relates to seeing the world through the lenses of one's opinions and believing one has a clear view of reality.

But Zen has its roots in India, and like a Zen Koan, if you make sense of it you are most likely on the wrong track.

If you want to write such a poem, you first must be capable of such a mind;
if you want to make such a picture, you must first be capable of grasping such a form.

'make' subsituted for 'paint' in the second line by me
from: The Zen Koan by Miura and Sasaki, 1965

 

[Nicholas Lindan]

If something is 'perfect' then it is, by definition, a dead-end. After all, perfection can not be improved on. It needs to be unperfected tout suite.

And perfection can not be used - if it is used it is no longer perfect as use alters the object.

Perfection is to be avoided at all costs. 'Good Enough' is best.

 

[Vaughn]

Unless, of course, the perfection is in its use. And the use of perfection is its existence as a target and around and around we go!

 

[Don_ih]

Perfection is to be avoided at all costs.

That's just perfect.

 

[Bob Merlin]

"It's good enough."
I used to own a tropical fish store and one of my little rules was "Good enough seldom is!"