Measurements are powerful

They allow us to visualize progress and set a horizon for our goals. But my scientific mind—lover of data and precision—often clashes with my instinctive side, driven by experience and intuition.

And as the saying goes, “you can’t see the forest for the trees”: the obsession with metrics can make us lose sight of what truly matters. It’s hard to quantify the unknown, but it’s easy to dream. The trouble with dreams is that they’re imprecise—but if history teaches us anything, it’s that success almost always follows the dream.

Does it make sense to ask a novelist how many pages their book will have when they’re just beginning to imagine the plot? Or to ask a painter how many brushstrokes are needed to move someone with a painting? Or a pianist how many notes there will be in the melody still forming in their mind?

I dare say the greater the quality of the outcome you aim for, the harder it is to estimate the effort it will take. Only what’s already known—and dare I say, what’s mundane—can be gauged by holding up your thumb and squinting.

Analyzing the past and measuring the present is important. But just as essential is daring to dream about the future. Because without dreams, we lose direction—even if the map is perfect.

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