5 Reasons Why Mastery Doesn’t Take 10,000 Hours

Prefer to listen? I recorded a full audio version for members inside Invisible World.

Heart

Let’s get one thing straight. I love Malcolm Gladwell.

You too? I’m a total fan and enjoy his books.

I’d definitely ask for his autograph and even double down for a selfie request.

Yuuuge fan except for one thing → the concept that exploded with the ‘10,000 Hour Rule’ in second chapter from the book Outliers.

You know that one? If not, skip this InspoLetter.

If you know it, pull up a chair, I’d love to get your take.

The concept went viral. Fire across dry prairie grass 🔥 

Want greatness? Mastery? Success? Expert in the field? Just practice over and over until you clock 10,000 hours.

Quoting from the book: “10k hours is the magic number of greatness.”

I was stoked. Someone simplified mastery to paint-by-numbers. I loved it.

I was baptized. A true disciple. Went every Sunday and read scriptures every morning. Started clocking my hours.

Plus the whole ‘rule’ title is so catchy: Ooh, a rule, it must work!

And it wasn’t just me, it was all over. Soon ‘10,000 hours’ showed up even in rap songs.

Note here: A personal goal of mine is that a rapper drops a hot lyric with InspoLetter or Invisible World someday). Could you imagine? Oh man, drop it like its hot 🎶🤣 

I bought in so deep, even the pink slips were on the table.

Felt so sophisticated too.

Sure hard work. Fine. But straightforward. I can work hard.

Just put the hours in, grind baby, practice practice practice. Yeah then one day I’ll really be something special. Can’t wait til then! So check back on me later, it (rather I) will be → magnanimous.

😮‍💨 The path to success was clear. Relief! Finally street lights to illuminate the yellow brick road!

But . . . as the tire tread wore on though, the trail was perpetually winding with false summits at every bend, and each accumulated hour weighed heavier than the last one.

Friend, something felt off, do you know that feeling?

In my Invisible World I wondered:

Maybe not guaranteed, but is it possible, that I’m already special, like right now? Do I have to wait until the clock strikes 10K? What might happen if I believe right now?

That felt existentially sinful. But could you imagine? What if . . . between us . . . you’re already a master?

I started thinking more about Proverbs 23:7, you too right?

So who is correct? Malcolm or 23:7?

Eventually my yellow brick road led me to create my:

5 Reasons Why Mastery Doesn’t Take 10,000 Hours

So buckle in, stay with me → here we go!

Reason 1: It Doesn’t Work

It just doesn’t work. So there’s that 😉 

Let’s Look Harder.

10,000 hours equals roughly 10 years. Okay. Let’s see 2 examples how that plays out.

First example: Jim Carrey’s Dad

Have you heard the commencement speech by Jim Carrey where he tells the story of his dad? How it inspired Jim to follow his passions as an actor?

It would be a bit weird if I retold it, you don’t need me for that.

I watch it once a year. Basically Jim’s dad always wanted to be a magician. Moonlighter. Must run in the family. Ultimately Jim’s dad opted for a career as an accountant. The safe path.

He had years of experience, just rounding the base hitting the magical 10,000 when the company laid off the department.

See the only guarantee you have with 10,000 Hours is . . . that you do something for 10,000 hours.

You can put 10,000 hours in and still fail. You can take the ‘safe path’ and still fail.

So as Jim says, “You might as well take a chance at doing what you love.”

Look harder—run the math yourself. Have you ever failed at something after 10,000 hours, or someone you personally know?

Second example: Marriage.

100? Here’s a mistake I make everyday: I confuse movement with progression. Especially in relationships. Just me?

Marriage and 10,000 Hours:

Showing up in a relationship is a developable skill. (Wish I would’ve known this sooner btw).

If 10,000 hours is about 10 years (as it suggests in the book), then question for you playing along at home: How many marriages make it longer than 10 years?

I already looked it up so I know, but just guess: How many years does the average marriage last? Got your guess?

The average marriage in the United States anyway, lasts 8 years or about 8,000 hours.

How is this possible? At 8,000 hours, almost to 10,000, these blissful couples should be nearly drunk on marital euphoria, nearly to a land dripping with milk and honey and flowering hillsides, with no fights no mortgages, and endless wild acrobatic chandelier passion.

Instead it’s over. They cancel. They actually choose reverting to hour 1 and start over!

Ahh.

I even roll my eyes at newly weds 🙄 

All lovey dovey. All squishy and gushy about something simple like passing the water across the table 🤮

I shrug them off.

Ah, just wait until they are 10 years in, until the washer goes out, until she cheats, until you pass on the Corvette to pay for junior’s college. Until I’m annoyed that I have to make dinner every night, until I’m scrolling through Facebook looking at past flames, until there’s not enough money to go on that trip, until they are ‘too tired’ . . . again. Until they buy 20K of Context Logic stock that goes bankrupt. Until they have a bunch of Nvidia stock they won’t sell when bills are do. Until I embarrass you by telling that story infront of your family. Until the extra driveway they started on the side of the house is still a half‑finished patch of dirt. Until they stayed out late again with ‘friends’.

I shake my head, yeah . . . just wait until you are an expert with 10,000 hours of marriage skill experience.

Hmm.

It might not be true. But is it possible that newly weds are actually the real masters of loving without judgement? Of putting the other first? Of being quick to forgive and forget?

Is it possible that inexperience can often be the advantage?

Reason 2: 100 Hour Superpower

🥊 Over the decades, the Rocky boxing movie enterprise has pulled in over 2B dollars, and has inspired millions.

When Slyvester Stallone was 29, as a struggling actor, he didn’t have 10,000 hours of writing manuscripts, yet fortunately he had something more valuable.

After watching a boxing match it sparked an idea. He immediately got to work and wrote ‘Rocky’ in 3.5 days or 84 hours, but we’re going to round up and call it 100 hours.

100 hours.

Was it thousands of pages? Uh no, it was only 90 pages long.

So what did he have? I call it the:

100 Hour Superpower 

Sly describes it best in his own words: “So this is one of those things, when you just roll the dice and fly by the proverbial seat of your pants and you just say, ‘I’ve got to try it. I’ve just got to do it. I may be totally wrong, and I’m going to take a lot of people down with me, but I just believe in it.’”

Roll the dice? Just try? Just go do it. Just believe in it. Hmm.

And I quote: “… fly by the proverbial seat of your pants”!

His words not mine.

Is 10,000 Hours an illusion? Am I wrong, missing something? Log in to Invisible World and direct message me with your take.

What doors might you open THIS WEEK if you use the 100 Hour Superpower?

This is getting long so » To Be Continued on Thursday . . .

Mind 🤯 

10,000 Hours became a corporate religion with Google, Microsoft, and many other big hitters implementing it into employee training and culture.

Tony Robbins, Brendon Burchard, and countless performance coaches used it as a foundational teaching. And Tony has made references to his ‘40,000 hours’.

Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber wrote a song “10,000 Hours” (2019), hit #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and over 1 billion streams on Spotify alone.

Even cerebral sophisticated, don’t you know about, Billboard 100, and back by popular demand illusions, are still just—illusions?

Tell me I’m wrong.

Soul ⚡️ 

🎶 I was made to slay them
Ten thousand hours

I'm so damn close I can taste it
On some Malcolm Gladwell
David-Bowie-meets-Kanye sh**

This is dedication
A life lived for art is never a life wasted
Ten thousand

Ten thousand hours felt like ten thousand hands
Ten thousand hands, they carry me 🎵 

— Ten Thousand Hours, song, Macklemore

P.S. For the record I love Macklemore’s music 😁 

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