How to Attain Mastery in Anything (4 Steps)

In our lives, we often aspire to be good at stuff.  Sometimes, we don’t want to be just “good,” but great, or masterful.  I know there have been and will be times in my life where I want to attain mastery at certain skills.

However, wanting to attain mastery and actually doing it are two completely different things.  What are the most valuable things you can do TODAY to start on your journey towards mastery?

It’s been said that it takes 10,000 hours to become a master at something.  But 10,000 hours doing what exactly?

I have always been taught this simple formula through Life Leadership’s top leaders:

1. Read
2. Listen
3. Associate
4. Act

Those are the four ESSENTIAL steps to becoming a master at anything – do those four things and then repeat them over and over.  But before you start doing any of those things, you need to decide what topic you want to become an expert on.  This can be anything you want to achieve greatness in (your career, your hobbies, your passions, etc…).

After you have chosen a skill, you can start on your journey towards mastery.

Read

Read anything you can find on your topic.  Most often, this reading material will be in the form of books.  Find people who have already achieved the level of mastery in your chosen field, and read their material.  And don’t just read it for fun, underline the book, highlight it, think about it, write out your thoughts, and digest it.  Learn what concepts you can apply today to be better, and what you need to work up towards.

Listen

Find podcasts on your topic from (again) experts in your chosen field.  Attend seminars featuring speakers who have achieved mastery in the topic you are interested in, take notes, and re-read your notes!  Writing things down that you’ve listened to helps to solidify the concepts in your mind.  Listen to audios in your car, while you’re doing chores around your house, and basically anytime you can.

Associate

You can read and listen all you want, and you will never achieve mastery if you’re not hanging around with the right people.  If you want to get better at something, hang out with people who are much better than you at that thing.  Observe what they do, ask them for help (mentorship), and strive to emulate them.  That said, you’re going to have to STOP associating with those who are pulling you off of your track to mastery.  It’s been said you are the average of the top 5 people you hang around with.  Choose wisely.

Act

Once again, you can do the previous three steps till you’re blue in the face, but it won’t amount to any results if you don’t act on what you’ve learned.  Take all of that knowledge you’ve attained through reading, listening, and associating, and act upon it!  At first, you won’t know what you don’t know, then you’ll feel awkward trying to figure things out, and then it will click.

 

After you have attained mastery, it’s extremely important that you continue to hone your skills and become better.  The most important thing to remember is you don’t know it all.  There’s always something you can do, something you can improve upon, and something to learn from someone else – even if they’re not “on your level.”

Perhaps I should have started with this, but in order to do any of the following, you’re going to have to have a hunger to learn.  Skills can be taught and mastered, but hunger cannot.  I can’t teach you to have hunger, and I can’t force it on to you – you have to have it.  If you don’t, you won’t be willing to put in 10,000 hours.  Especially in the hardest times.

So, be hungry, start reading, listening, and associating, and act upon your knowledge until you’ve attained mastery.  Stay focused even when it’s hard, and you’ll be amazed at what you can accomplish.

 

Until next time,

Hope Frances

 

Photo by Ariel Besagar on Unsplash