Most of my family and many of my closest friends call me a pessimist. I disagree. I believe I am a pro-active optimist, someone whose default is that things will work out in the end - but not automatically. Only if we do our part to ensure success.

When I challenge their characterization of me as a pessimist, the response is generally along the lines of: “You always assume the worst possible thing will probably occur.”  But I am not assuming that at all.

• Have a pleasant conversation.
• Find commonality.
• Ask, don't tell.
• Listen to learn.
• Stories and ideas, not facts.

This is Derek Sivers' version of a quote based on the opening of a David Foster Wallace address* to the 2005 graduating class at Kenyon College:

I precipitated a recent online discussion about healthcare’s obsession with measurement (quality metrics is the current buzz phrase) when I quoted two aphorisms that highlight some problems with metrics and targets:

Goodhart's Law: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure,"

Campbell's Law: "The more a metric is used, the more likely it is to "corrupt the process it is intended to monitor."

One comment rubbed me the wrong way because it implied that measurement reduces harm:

a total stranger one black day

(by edward estlin (e e ) cummings)

a total stranger one black day
knocked living the hell out of me-- 

who found forgiveness hard because
my(as it happened)self he was 

-but now that fiend and i are such
immortal friends the other's each.