History is made by those who failed well

History is made by those who failed well. Not by people who knew everything in advance.

Since I was young, I wondered why the world looks the way it does. Who shaped it?

Most people secretly believe the world was built by someone smarter than them. Some authority, some government, some group of professionals who always knew what they were doing. It feels safer to think that. If something matters enough, surely "they" have it covered.

But there is no "they." That's the part people miss. The world isn't the product of a master plan executed by experts. It's what happened when a bunch of people tried things. And usually, they didn't fully know what they were doing.

If you look closely at how anything significant got built, you find the same story. Someone thought, "Maybe this will work," and tried it. Rockefeller didn't start out with a master plan to rule the oil industry. He had to deal with unexpected move by competitor to stay on top of the game.

The Sumerians who made the first wheel didn't foresee cars or airplanes. Gaudí didn't finish the Sagrada Família. Progress doesn't look like a straight line planned by experts. It looks like experiments, many of which fail.

It also means substantial resources could be invested before we know a sure answer.

School teaches you there's always a right answer. Someone already solved the problem, and your job is to memorize it. That makes it easy to believe real life works the same way—that knowledge comes first, then action. But usually, it's the other way around.

Action isn't something you do after you've collected all the knowledge. Action is knowledge, crystallized. It contains more information than words ever can.

If you've ever coded, you know it's almost impossible to explain your code in plain words better than the code itself does. The code is the clearest version of your thinking.

Failing well doesn't mean failing randomly. It means pushing into territory where no one has succeeded yet. That's how you learn things worth knowing.

In Elon's early-days interview at Tesla, he said it would probably fail. But he also knew that even a failed attempt could push electric cars forward. He was willing to test reality instead of waiting for certainty. So far, he hasn't failed—and Tesla has changed the auto industry.

Aim to fail well. It's easier to start that way as well.