The moment you have an answer
you start defending it.
That is human.
You built it.
You are proud of it.
It has your name on it now.
And so, quietly,
you stop looking for a better one.
The answer becomes the thing you protect
instead of the thing you test.
But the answer was never the point.
The problem was the point.
The answer is just the best guess
you happened to have
on the day you needed one.
A better guess
should be a gift,
not a threat.
If you love your solution,
every new idea
is an attack.
If you love the problem,
every new idea
is a clue.
Same information.
Opposite reaction.
The difference is only
what you decided to be loyal to.
Watch the good ones work.
They hold their answers loosely.
They say "here's what I think, so far."
They change their mind in public
and call it progress,
not defeat.
Watch the stuck ones.
They married the first solution.
Now every fact that disagrees
has to be wrong,
because the alternative
is that they were.
Ego picks the answer.
Curiosity picks the problem.
Only one of them
lets you keep getting better
after you are already good.
So when the evidence turns,
turn with it.
Let the answer go
if the problem outgrew it.
You are not the code you wrote.
You are not the plan you made.
You are the person
trying to solve the thing,
and that person
is only diminished
by clinging to a worse solution
out of pride.
Stay loyal to the question.
Answers are cheap.
The willingness to trade them up
is the rare and expensive part.
Love the problem.
It will love you back
with better answers
than the one you were guarding.
– Serguey Asael Shinder
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