Hello!
Seiiti Arata.
If you study the classics, then you must know a great thinker known as Logan, who used to
say “I’m the best there is at what I do.
But what I do isn’t very nice”.
Let us pay attention to the first part of this quote…
being the best at what you do.
This is a very interesting idea.
Try to think of some person who is the best at what they do.
For example, that football player you consider the best in the world.
Try imagining how he managed to arrive at such a high performance level.
It is very easy to create a series of misconceptions about how he became so good at what he does.
He looks like someone with a supernatural talent who leads a wonderful life, thanks
to that special talent.
However, behind any flawless performance, there is a lot of repetitive training that
most people may consider boring.
But those who are very good at what they do, face that training with passion.
And, if you want to be excellent at anything, you also need to fall in love with boredom.
In order to perfect any skill, deliberate practice is necessary.
Deliberate practice consists in a constant repetition of actions with the intention of
improving the small details.
Now think about your life.
What do you intend to do?
What is your superpower?
Any professional, academic or personal skill can be acquired and refined.
Learning something and becoming average at that activity is relatively easy.
But today we are talking about a greater ambition: becoming REALLY good at what you do.
To be above average, there is a price you need to pay.
And what is that price?
You need to deal with the boredom of doing the same thing over and over again, day after
day, month after month, year after year, always striving for improvement.
Even when what you are doing seems too easy, even so you need to review the foundations
and keep repeating until you become excellent.
That is why being above average at anything is much more boring than it seems.
And that is also why so many people keep looking for shortcuts, hacks, tricks to skip that
boring part and go straight to the final result.
But the reality is that, to be excellent, you have to love boredom.
The path to excellence is to continue focused even when boredom takes over.
When you decide you want to become good at something, the initial excitement makes you
get into action.
You start practicing that skill, reading about that topic, looking for inspiration in other
people that are references in the subject.
The problem is that this initial excitement ends up disappearing.
And then you move on to the next project, you start trying something else, you look
for a shortcut to become excellent at it...
But, in order to become good at what you do, you simply need to practice with clear intention
of improvement.
It is only through thousands of hours of deliberate practice that you will be able to refine your
skill and be above average at the skill you chose.
A common excuse that people who do not manage to achieve excellence use is saying that they
lost the passion or the motivation for that subject.
But in order to be one of a kind, having passion or motivation for the topic is not enough,
you also need to have the ability to continue focused even when boredom hits and you have
to practice day after day, studying and practicing the same skill over and over again.
It is wrong to say that, in order for you to become really good at something, you just
need to be passionate about it.
There is an old video I made about that and is still relevant.
It is called “How to Learn Anything Difficult” and you can check it out by clicking the link
https://arata.se/studymastery - there, I talk about the great problem of being a Dabbler,
who is the person that only uses the initial excitement feeling.
That person is very motivated to start, but gives up quickly.
The problem with being a Dabbler is that all of those emotions are transitory, temporary.
When you need to keep practicing even on the days where you do not think what you are doing
is exciting, there is a good chance that you will give up.
So, be careful with the discourse that says that loving what you do is enough.
This kind of narrative ends up causing disappointment in people, especially when they enter the
work phase in which excitement is over, they move on to a plateau in which they need to
repeat their work several times.
Anyone can act when they are motivated.
What makes all the difference is to keep acting even when motivation wears off.
In order to keep on acting even when motivation goes away, it is ideal to be committed to
well structured processes.
Imagine a gymnast.
She has a well structured process, designed by her technical team.
Every day, she goes to the training center and she executes the process.
She warms up, repeats the basic movements, does the specific training, and goes home
to rest.
The next day, she does it all over again.
If an athlete focuses only on the moment he is taking part in a great competition or winning
an olympic medal, he is unlikely to be able to repeat that process for long.
The opposite happens: the athlete that reaches excellence is the one that commits to fulfilling
the training process several times, for a long time, even when he has no motivation
or is completely bored.
This applies to everything.
If you want to be a great writer, you need to commit to the writing process.
If you want to be a great investor, you need to commit to the process of studying finances
and investing your money regularly.
If you want to be fit, you need to commit to the process of following a diet, training
and resting.
It doesn’t look too attractive, and it really is not.
But it is the path that needs to be walked.
And whenever you try to take a shortcut, it will probably end up taking you even longer
to reach excellence.
The path to be who you desire is already defined.
Now you only need to walk down that path.
I do not know exactly what your great life objective is.
I do not know what specific area you want to stand out in, I do not know what you want
to be known for.
But I know one thing: certainly, someone in the world has already walked down that path
you want to take.
That is why your job basically consists in modelling what those other people did, detailing
that in a couple of practical steps and then taking those steps by yourself to see what
works for you.
In other words, it is studying, understanding, trying and repeating.
As many times as necessary.
But it is not enough to just look at the results of the person who has what you want to have.
You need to look at what they did to get those results.
For example, someone who dreams about becoming a football player cannot look only at the
moment of the game, at the “best moments” clips of these players.
He needs to look at the training process that allowed the player to reach that level.
That kind of perspective makes you realize that the process is much less attractive than
it seems.
A great player does not become one of a kind by playing for fun with his friends once a
week.
He needs to do daily exercises in motor coordination, weight training, running, and tactical training.
He needs to follow the right diet, take supplements and have good nights of sleep.
All of this is less fun than it sounds when we watch a great game on TV.
That is why, when you model those excellent people who have already walked the path you
want to follow, remember not to look only on the outside, but on the inside.
In the beginning, even that inside will seem interesting.
You are starting your journey, discovering new things every moment, getting your first
results.
But as time passes, the routine becomes less fun.
You need to be prepared for this paradox.
The better you become at a certain skill, the less amusing and interesting it is to
practice that activity.
And only those who manage to overcome that boredom and continue on their path even when
it is no longer interesting are the ones who reach excellence and become exceptional.
Of course you can use techniques to make the process slightly less boring.
You can use gamification techniques, you can modify your routines, you can try to challenge
yourself.
But, ultimately, being really good at something means forgetting that idea about your passion
and embracing boredom.
If you do that, you will get your reward.
Think about boredom as the price you need to pay in order to reach excellence in your
field.
That way, you get to fall in love with boredom and keep walking to reach the results and
the acknowledgement you desire so much.
In order to be really good at something, you need to get over with the idea that excellence
comes from some passion or innate talent you have.
And you need to embrace the idea of repeating a skill several times until becoming good
at it, even when motivation fades and boredom takes over.
That seems much less fun than those pieces of advice about following your passion and
living life intensely.
Maybe this is not what you want to hear.
But we are not here to tell you what you want to hear, but to tell you what you need to
hear.
This is the best way for you to develop as a person and reach the results you want to
achieve, in a cycle of constant improvement.
If you are interested in constant improvement, specifically learning how to use deliberate
practice to improve your performance in any skill.
I invite you to get to know the course Intelligence Arata Academy, that you can access right now
by checking out the link https://arata.se/intelligence