Practice...

I recently read a great article in Wine Spectator entitled 10,000 Hours by Matt Kramer. Essentially, the article talks about expertise. According to Daniel Levitin, cognitive psychologist and author of This Is Your Brain on Music, it takes approximately 10,000 hours to achieve expertise in any field.

“In study after study of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, and what have you, this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is the equivalent to roughly three hours a day, or twenty hours a week, of practice over ten years.”

Kramer goes on to talk about 10,000 hours in the context of wine expertise. He concludes that real experts “not only put in the time, they put in their hearts.” And perhaps that is the true mark of an expert. Practice and Passion.

Passion is what drives people to be great. Practice is what builds expertise. If you truly love what you do and commit yourself to disciplined practice, there is nothing that can truly deny you from achieving expertise.

What Passion do you intend to Practice?

Changes...

Change seems to be the only constant in life. After 20 years with the same employer, I’ve struck out on my own. Change is sometimes thrust upon us. Other times, change is necessary if we’re going to grow and move ahead. In my case, it was a bit of both.

After being with the same employer for so long, I needed a new challenge. Rather than look for another job (while it was safe and initially appealing), I wanted the challenge of building and growing my own business. I wanted to feel excited about a new venture. It’s often been said that, on our death bed, we don’t regret what we have done so much as we regret what we did not try. I did not want to look back at my life and think “Man, I should have started my own company…”

I’ve had the honor of coaching a number of individuals in my career. At some level, each individual had issues with the fear of trying something new. So, when it came time to really DO this, I found myself feeling the same kind of fear. But here’s the thing I found myself saying – feel the fear and do it anyway.

That’s the lesson I’ve taken from this…

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