Entrepreneurs vs. Critics

The world has two types of people:

1) Those who do things
2) Those who criticize those who do things

It's very easy to criticize the athlete that misses the championship-winning shot. Or the entrepreneur who dreamed big but came up short in his endeavors.

It's particularly easy to criticize when one is sitting on the sidelines, protected from any risk of failure or ridicule.

Now consider the following quote by Theodore Roosevelt:

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

I simply love that quote.

There is no doubt in my mind which one I'd rather be.