I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.
— Louisa May Alcott
Have you ever heard of the 10,000 hour rule? The 10,000 hour rule was popularized by Malcolm Gladwell and states that to become a master at something requires 10,000 hours of practice. The problem with the 10,000 hour rule is that it doesn’t give the whole story. Simply doing an activity is not enough to become a master at it.
Consider learning to play a sport like tennis. You may learn to play at an acceptable level and then play regularly enough to accrue 10,000 hours of play time. However, if you are only play at your current level, you simply become a master at playing mediocre tennis.
To improve and truly become a master at anything requires more than time, it requires deliberate practice. Deliberate practice is practice that focuses on tuning and perfecting specific skills. It is practice that pushes the boundaries of your present abilities.
For example, in tennis deliberate practice might be practicing 100 serves every day until you can reliably serve the ball to any position on the court. In basketball, deliberate practice might be shooting hundreds or thousands of three point shots to perfect your form and accuracy. In sailing, deliberate practice might be seeking out the storms to learn to better pilot your ship.
In all areas of life, we can seek out deliberate practice and expend effort to expand our skills and abilities. This can be challenging because it forces us out of our comfort zone, but outside of our comfort zone is where true growth lives. If we want to become a skilled sailor, we have to learn from the storms.
What is one area of your life where you can engage in more challenging deliberate practice?