#31 - Practice Makes Perfect

What if there was some way to “power pose” my way to success—you know, bypass all the hard work and patience. Wouldn’t that be nice? Well, probably not—I don’t think success would be the same without all the hard work, patience, blood, sweat, and tears. Regardless, it’s not worth losing sleep over because it’s simply not something we can control. Still, I’m sure you’ve heard the saying, “Practice makes perfect.” As we’ve talked about in the confidence, stress, and pressure sections, practice will aid with all of those challenges.

One popular theory is the “Law of 10,000 hours.” This theory states that in order to become great at something, you must put in 10,000 hours of practice. While many successful people have done this more or less, the concept itself is more valuable than the specific number of hours. Research shows that our brains respond to practice. Basketball players shoot better from the free-throw line with their feet on the ground than they do as a jump shot. This indicates that practice has made the specific motions involved in a free throw more “automatic.” Other research has shown that elite violinists brains respond differently while performing than amateur violinists. Both of these examples support the effects of brain plasticity—over time and many hours of practice, the brain is retrained to become specialized in a specific task.

A famous quote by Earl Nightingale is, “One hour per day of study will put you at the top of your field within three years. Within five years you’ll be a national authority. In seven years, you can be one of the best people in the world at what you do.” Besides gaining some knowledge, studying like this is just practice. The exact number of hours again is debatable, but imagine the results you could get if you put one hour per day into your passion. Over just one year you’ll put in two full weeks of 24-hour days of practice (even if you miss a couple days).

It seems so simple—practice a lot and you’ll be successful. If it’s really that simple, why don’t more people do it? Well, the simple answer is “all the other stuff.” It’s hard to have the discipline to put in the hard work. It’s hard to know what’s actually important to you. You need confidence that your practice will pay off. You can’t just practice aimlessly; you need goals, direction, and accountability. Yes, it boils down to practice but there’s a lot that supports that practice.

Look back over those last few sentences. What do you notice? Yes, all of those important components of practice have been sections of Advancing Daily. Today I want you to tie together some of the content we’ve covered:

1. What’s important to you? Actually Important.

2. What goals can you set to help you achieve step 1?

3. How can you manage your time and energy to fit practice into your routine?

4. How will you hold yourself accountable to put in the practice?

5. Go practice!

Do other things besides practice play a role? Of course. I can’t guarantee that in exactly 10,000 hours you will become famous or get drafted into the NFL or make a million dollars—but will it help you to feel pressure about things you can’t control? You can control your practice. If you apply these lessons to the things that are important to you, I think you’ll be surprised with the results you get.