Don't try to be different. Just be good. To be good is different enough.

The remark cautions against chasing novelty for its own sake. “Different” can become a performative goal—anxious, trend-driven, or contrarian—whereas “good” points to craft, integrity, and disciplined excellence. The second sentence flips the common assumption that originality must be forced: if the work is genuinely good, it will naturally distinguish itself amid mediocrity and imitation. Read this way, the quote is both aesthetic advice (focus on quality rather than gimmick) and ethical counsel (let substance, not self-advertisement, be the basis of distinction). It also implies a quiet confidence: excellence is a rarer and more durable form of uniqueness than deliberate eccentricity.