Quotes by Scott Raymond Adams

I think the pleasure of completed work is what makes blogging so popular. You have to believe most bloggers have few if any actual readers. The writers are in it for other reasons. Blogging is like work, but without coworkers thwarting you at every turn. All you get is the pleasure of a completed task.

You need a healthy ego to endure the abuse that comes with any sort of success. The trick is to think of your ego as your goofy best friend who lends moral support but doesn’t know shit.

One of the great things about being ignorant is that I often think my ideas are original. It’s a wonderful feeling. That’s why I try to avoid any knowledge that would spoil the sensation. Sometimes it isn’t easy. People keep hurling knowledge at me, and I can’t always duck.

If I had to pick one quality that best predicts success (other than wanting to be successful) it would be the willingness to risk embarrassment.

Our perceptions of truth are built around what is practical, not what is true. Even the smartest human brain doesn’t have the capacity for discerning true facts. That’s why so many of us settle for scientific facts. It’s the best we can do.

One day, about ten years ago, I was alone in my office, sitting on the couch and reflecting on the fact that I had managed to become rich and famous in my dream job. For the first time in my life, I had no goals. And for a goal-oriented guy, that’s an empty feeling. Success was supposed to feel good and stay that way. But it tricked me. There was a huge hole in my soul. I sat in my office and sobbed.

Then the change happened. It wasn’t something I thought about. It wasn’t an indication that I am a good person or a bad person. It was just some sort of chemical reaction in my moist robot head. It was natural.

I turned outward.

And in so doing, bit by bit, I found meaning. I found ways to use my success to make the world a little bit better. It’s surprising how often the opportunity comes up. It ranges from personal favors to investment decisions to my choices to continue making a comic and a blog post for you every day.

Happiness = health + money + social life + meaning

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To make the Happiness Formulas extra useful, the highest priorities would appear first (leftmost) in the formula. For example, in the top Happiness Formula (Happiness = health + money + social life + meaning), health is a higher priority than money, which is a higher priority than social life, etc.

I realize you’ll argue with my ranking of priorities and point out all the exceptions. For example, if you have no money, you can’t afford to be healthy. But the formula only shows priorities, not absolutes. Obviously you always need a source of money, but the priority list shows that you shouldn’t take a job with high pay that will significantly affect your health. It makes more sense to get healthy and then leverage your health to get the best job. (Healthy looking people land better jobs and are more highly paid. Their brains work better too, and they have more energy.)

I rank money higher than social life or meaning because once you have money, those other things are easier to get. For example, you won’t have much of a social life if you can’t afford to do anything. And you can’t make money if your health is a mess.

Priority-wise, it simply makes sense to take care of yourself before you start searching for a higher meaning. You aren’t much good to anyone else if you’re unhealthy, a financial burden, or an emotional basket case. Fix yourself before you turn outward. It’s best for everyone.

One Dilbert Blog reader noted that current research shows that happiness causes success more than success causes happiness. That makes sense to me. There’s plenty of research about people having a baseline of happiness that doesn’t vary much with circumstances. And given that happy people are typically optimistic, energetic, and fun to work with, I can see how happiness would lead to success.

Dilbert Principle: The most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage: management.