The Columbus Egg Principle

read and listen on sahilbloom.com​

​read time 2 minutes

Welcome to The Curiosity Chronicle, a newsletter where I provide actionable ideas to help you build a high-performing, healthy, wealthy life.

Forwarded this email? Join 800,000+ other readers here.

Bestselling author Mel Robbins said my book "will push you to rethink everything about how you’re spending your time." Join 300,000+ readers and order it today on a big sale!

Get The 5 Types of Wealth Now!

---

The Columbus Egg Principle

There’s an old fable about Christopher Columbus that I like…

In 1493, upon return from his first voyage to the Americas (which he mistakenly identified as the East Indies), a group of Spanish nobles gathered for a celebratory dinner with Christopher Columbus.

The nobles diminished his accomplishment, saying, “Anyone could have sailed west and found land. You just happened to get there first.”

Columbus smiled, reached for a boiled egg, and issued a wager:

“Stand this egg on its tip,” he said, “and I’ll concede your point.”

One by one they tried, until frustration gave way to defeat.

Columbus then took the same egg, gave the tip a gentle tap that flattened a sliver of shell, and set it upright.

“You see,” Columbus said, “Once you see the move, it feels inevitable.”

Lesson: Obvious is a post-achievement label.

Breakthroughs may appear obvious with the benefit of hindsight, but this masks the struggle, ridicule, and failure absorbed by the pioneer on the journey to get there.

Many of the most transformative companies of the last decade were laughed out of the room in their early days.

• A prominent venture capitalist called Airbnb a “serial killer app” for its idea of strangers sleeping on your couch

• Incumbents ridiculed Apple for removing the keyboard when it launched the iPhone

• Blockbuster execs shrugged off Netflix when approached about an acquisition

The best idea looks crazy—until someone does it.

What’s the idea sitting in your Notes app that feels obvious to you but crazy to everyone else?

True innovation is often met with ridicule at the outset. Enduring that non-belief is the cost of entry for anyone who wants to alter the status quo.

Innovation is about everyone agreeing with you...later.

So, as you embrace that cost of entry, remember these timeless words:

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

Dance to your music. Let everyone join in later.