You can go from knowing nothing about a skill to learning that skill in just 20 hours. It takes just 20 hours to learn a new skill. If you put 20 hours of focused deliberate practice into that thing, you’ll be astounded. 20 hours is achievable. It’s about 45 minutes a day for a month.
There is a method to do that. because it’s not like you can just start fiddling around for about 20 hours and expect this massive improvement. There is a way to practice intelligently.
1. Deconstruct the skill: – Decide exactly what you want to be able to do when you’re done, and then look into the skill and break it down into smaller pieces. Most of the things that we think of as skills are actually a big bundle of skills that require all sorts of little things. The more you can break apart the skill, the more you’re able to decide what are the parts of the skills that would help me to achieve what I want.
2. Learn enough to self correct: – Get three to five resources about what you’re trying to learn. Learn just enough that you can actually practice and self correct or self edit as you practice. Learning becomes a way of getting better at noticing when you’re making a mistake and then doing something a little different.
3. Remove barriers to practice: – Remove the distractions that are keeping you from practicing.
4. Practice for at least 20 hours: – By pre-committing to practicing whatever it is that you want to do for at least 20 hours, you will be able to overcome the initial frustration barrier and stick with the practice long enough to actually reap the rewards.
The major barrier is not intellectual, it’s emotional.
It’s not the process of you learning a bunch of little tips or things. The major barrier is emotional. We’re scared. Feeling stupid doesn’t feel good, in the beginning of learning something new, you feel really stupid. But, put 20 hours into anything. Doesn’t matter what you want to learn. Go out and do that thing. It takes just 20 hours.