Do you want to become a master at something? Then you gotta do two things!

1.      Exchange perfectionism for curiosity!

Perfection is not the same as mastery. In fact, perfection can keep you from achieving mastery. Because mastery comes experimenting, from cycles of trying and tweaking.

But if you’re a perfectionist, this can stop you from trying. Because you’re never ready to try. You’re never ready to take action. You have a need to be perfect first. Or you think your approach needs to be perfect, your method needs to be perfect,… but how could it possibly be perfect without trying what works?

Mastery requires practice.

It requires repetition, learning through different approaches, through various (and often numerous) attempts to achieve the desired result. We experiment with an approach and then we keep correcting it until we obtain the result we want. This doesn’t always happen without research.

So, stop being a perfectionist, or you will stop yourself from becoming a master!

2.      Teach while you learn

When we teach others to do the thing we are learning and studying, we will uncover gaps that need to be filled. We will figure out different ways to express the content we study so it becomes congruent and comprehensible to others.

This will not only allow us to gain additional clarity for ourselves as we are finding more refined ways to explain the subject-matter and its context. It will also improve our communication about it. Teaching will inspire us to go beyond the surface level of our studies.

We will want to be prepared for questions, and we may stumble across related topics that are worth exploring to broaden and deepen our knowledge. As we teach, our students will bring new aspects to our attention that might be worth looking into.

Teaching others is one of the most effective ways to teach ourselves. 

Curious what your experience with achieving mastery is and what you’d want to add to my items 1 & 2.