The arrogance of age must submit to be taught by youth. — Edmund Burke

The arrogance of age must submit to be taught by youth.

Author: Edmund Burke

Insight: We tend to treat experience like a finished product—something you accumulate and then stop needing to revise. But Burke's observation cuts against that comfortable idea. The trap of getting older isn't just becoming set in your ways; it's mistaking familiarity for truth. You've seen how things work before, so you assume you know how they'll work now. Except the world keeps shifting in ways that don't respect your track record. What makes this sting a little is recognizing that young people often see things more clearly precisely because they haven't internalized the "that's just how it is" part yet. They ask the obvious questions that seem naive until you realize nobody's answered them properly. This doesn't mean youth always has better answers—experience genuinely matters. But the real skill isn't defending what you know; it's staying curious enough to let someone else's fresh perspective actually challenge you. The practical version? When a younger colleague, friend, or even your kid questions your approach, the instinct is usually to explain why they're missing context. Sometimes they are. But just often enough, they're seeing something you've stopped seeing because you've gotten too comfortable with the explanation.