PNTV - Talent Is Overrated by Geoff Colvin

You're listening to Optimize with Brian Johnson. More wisdom in less time. Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to Philosopher's Notes. TV today. You guessed it, another great book, Talent is Overrated by Jeff Colvin. Talent is overrated. What really separates world class performers from, from everybody else? Jeff basically says, look, if all elite performance takes a lot of time, then talent alone can't be the determining factor. What is? I'll give you a hint. Two little words. Hard work. Hard work separates the elite performers from the rest. Specifically, 10 years of delivery practice, which we're going to talk about. 10 years, 10,000 hours. That's what the research has shown. Whether we're talking about scientists or X ray evaluators or chess players or musicians or athletes, any field, true mastery, true great performance. That's sustainable. And, and at that level, 10 years, 10,000 hours, for those doing the math, that is approximately four hours a day times five days a week equals 20 hours per week, times 50 equals 1,000 hours per year, times 10 equals 10,000. It's a lot of work and that's exciting because now we know we may or may not want to put in that level of effort. But when we separate this idea that someone's born a genius versus that someone may have had some natural talent, but they worked extraordinarily hard, then we realize we too can work either kind of hard or sort of hard or really hard or extraordinarily hard and improve our ability to perform at a high level. That's exciting. Rather than they were just born that way. I don't have it, so I can't do anything about it. Now the second big idea is related to that. The Mozart myth. This is a great story and Jeff Colvin tells it well. Mozart. So we all know he was extraordinary. He was producing a prodigious amount of stuff at a very young age. But the reality is he produced his first masterpiece at 21 years old. So, so we look at that and we're like, wow, 21. And he was doing some good work. Not masterpiece quality, a lot of copying at a young age. And then he did his masterpiece at 21. Now that's young, no question about it. But the reality is, at 21, Mozart had been working for 18 years. His dad, Leopold, literally, emphasis on literally working, wrote the book on how to teach kids music. He's one of his era's leading teachers on music. That's amazing. Not a bad place for our little Wolfgang to grow up, right? He watched his dad train his older sister from the day he was born. At three years old, he started working incredibly hard and did so for 18 years and produced his first masterpiece. So it's a myth to think that Mozart was just born a genius. He was born with whatever natural ability he had into a family of musicians, a father who was an extraordinary teacher, and then he worked extraordinarily hard. Carol Dweck says. Was it his natural ability, Mozart's? Or was it the fact that he worked so hard that his hands became deformed? His hands became deformed? That's nuts. That's a quick look at the Mozart myth again. Greatness is made more than it's born. We've got to put in the effort. Ten years, 10,000 hours. Now, what kind of effort matters? Jeff tells us we need to do deliberate practice. We've talked about this a little bit in different times. Deliberate practice. What is that? Well, there's your comfort zone. You're not going to get a lot done hanging out in your comfort zone all the time. So you need to stretch out into what he calls your learning zone. Sideways writing. Now, you don't want to go so far past your learning zone that you're in your panic zone. That's not helpful. You're not going to do anything good in that zone. You want to play in this zone, your learning zone. You're stretching outside of your comfort zone. By definition, that's not comfortable and discomfort. But you didn't go so far that you snapped, that you panicked and get overwhelmed, and you give up the learning zone. You want to spend time in the learning zone. Now, that's hard work. The best performers who do a ton of deliberate practice can't do more than four or five hours a day of deliberate practice. And what's interesting, too, is that they did research on, I think it was violinists, and everyone knows great performers know that it takes a ton of practice. But what they found was the elite performers did their deliberate practice when they had the best energy, when they were fresh, early in the morning or whenever or early in the day when they had the energy to put their best effort into it. The average performer knew they needed to practice. They put in a little bit of effort, but they did so at the end of the day when they were tired. You can't perform here when you're exhausted, period. They also find that people who do this kind of work tend to nap more. They need more rest because they're putting themselves out there. So that's it for big idea number three, deliberate practice. And by the way, that's this number 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. Not going through the motions, but trying to get better again. The best among us love what they do so much. They're so committed to mastery. The best, they show up diligently, patiently, persistently. And you're not going to put in that effort into something you don't love. So you need to find that thing that's intrinsically inspiring for you, et cetera, et cetera. Now, the fourth big idea is a good one. Again, great performance doesn't come instantaneously. And he says, think of it more like a rose blooming. So if you plant a rose seed, you don't get something extraordinary the next day. It takes time to cultivate. You need to prune it. You need to do this, you need to do that. You give it time and you will have a rose that grows and then it blooms. Even when it starts to grow, it doesn't just show up in full bloom. It goes through a process. So do we. We cultivate our abilities and allow that to bloom. Think of that. When you think of your talents and you get upset that you're not where you want to be quite yet, well, great. Get back to work. Focus on the process of showing up and doing your good work. Make that primary. Let the blooming take care of itself. You want to measure your success on horticultural time, not clock time. Be patient. These things take time. Fifth big idea. Most important one, really. Do you believe. Do you believe that you actually can improve your skill and if you're really into it, potentially create a great level of skill? Do you believe that's possible? Because if you don't believe that, you're not going to put in the effort. But if you do believe that and you have a growth mindset, as Carol Dweck says, instead of a fixed mindset, which basically says you either have it or you don't. And you don't believe what I just told you about Mozart. If you're in the fixed mindset. Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. He was born that way. Still, he had this amazing genetic disposition, and that's why he was Mozart, if that's your orientation. You don't believe that you can truly become better than you are right now. Now, again, you may not want to put in the effort required to be at the highest level performance, but it's so important to know unequivocally and to believe that we can improve ourselves in whatever domain, in whatever capacity we want to optimize. So there you go. Do you believe? Fifth big idea. Bloom like a beautiful rose. Give it time. Cultivate deliberate practice. You're not going nuts in your panic zone, but you're also not chilling in your comfort zone. You're in your learning zone. A little bit uncomfortable, discomfort rather, but you're putting in your time, deliberately practicing. Remember, Mozart was born. His dad taught music. He was a stud. He worked since he was three years old. Grinding away, working furiously hard is another phrase that Carol Dweck used. It's a myth to think that he was born and just popped out of the womb doing his thing. Ten years, 10,000 hours. That's what the research shows. The top performers have put in that amount of time. What do you love so much you'd even consider putting in that level of effort? How can you create your life where that's what you get to do more and more often? And on a broader level, embrace the fact that we can optimize. We can get better in any and every aspect of our lives. Hope you enjoyed. I look forward to sharing more with you soon. Have another awesome day. See you. Hi, this is Brian. I hope you enjoyed that Philosopher's Notes TV episode. If so, I think you'll enjoy everything else we offer at BrianJohnson me. Two basic things one our free newsletter. It's it's called the Optimizer. Over 50,000 people start their day with it and they tell us it's pretty awesome. 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