Neither from affectation nor carelessness. Many have some remarkable and individual quality leading to eccentric actions. These are more defects than excellent differences... Such eccentricities simply serve as trademarks through their atrocious singularity: they cause either derision or ill-will.
Baltasar Gracián, 1647 (tr. Joseph Jacobs, 1892)
There is a difference between genuine distinctiveness and a conspicuous quirk, and the maxim is blunt that the second is usually a defect wearing the costume of individuality. Eccentricities, whether cultivated for effect or simply left uncorrected through carelessness, tend to become the trademark by which you are known, and it is rarely a flattering one; the singular oddity attracts derision or ill-will, not the distinction its owner imagines. This does not mean erasing yourself into blandness. It means not letting a repellent habit or a self-conscious oddity become the first thing people associate with you, because it crowds out everything of real value. Be distinctive through substance and quality, not through the quirk that makes you memorable for the wrong reason.
Practice
- Distinguish real distinctiveness from a conspicuous quirk; the first rests on quality, the second on singularity for its own sake (maxim 168 warns against cultivated folly).
- Correct the eccentricity that has become your trademark, whether cultivated or careless; it is crowding out the substance you would rather be known for.
- Be memorable through excellence, not oddity; the distinction that lasts is built on what you do well, not on what makes you strange (maxim 297 acts as if always seen).
Use this when
- Use this as self-examination, especially if you suspect you are known for a quirk rather than for your work.
- Use it in professional settings where a repellent habit or affected oddity caps how you are taken (maxim 87 keeps the polish).
Ignore this when
- Don't crush genuine individuality into conformity; the target is the repellent or affected quirk, not real distinctiveness (maxim 63 still prizes being first of a kind).
- Don't obsess over every harmless idiosyncrasy; the maxim targets what causes derision or ill-will, not every small human peculiarity.
A picture of it
Known throughout his industry, a talented professional is remembered not for his work but for a cultivated verbal tic and a deliberately odd manner he believes make him memorable. They do make him memorable, as the answer to "which one is he," which is not the memory that gets a person handed serious work. When the important projects keep going to others, he finally hears what the oddity has been advertising: a trademark of singularity where a reputation for substance should have been. The quirk he thought set him apart was the very thing capping how far he was trusted to go.
Be known for your substance, not your singularity. The quirk you think makes you memorable is usually memorable for the wrong reason.