From Awkward to Expert: How Embracing Failure Can Catapult Your Skills to New Heights
The Pottery Class Experiment that Holds the Key to Success in Any Endeavor
At a party in September of 2010, my then-girlfriend and I won beer pong seven games in a row. Great night. Two months earlier, we lost constantly.
Why is this the opening to my vaguely business-y newsletter?
Because we were terrible at beer pong in July. Truly no good. We played a lot of beer pong from July to September. Not drinking, we just set up cups of water on the dining room table1 and played a few games of beer pong every time we saw each other. And we got a lot better. We kept a spreadsheet, shots to points. Shots to win. Who scored more (always her). I wish I still had this spreadsheet, I had it not long ago. We played dozens of games, and we got pretty good.
Again, why? Because:
If you want to be good at something, do it a lot.
This is obvious.
Still, the notion is lost on people. People generally don’t want to do things they’re not good at. I’m learning Italian. I’m not great at it. Every time I speak Italian, it literally causes me to sweat. It’s embarrassing to be sweaty while not pronouncing your chi and che correctly.
And frankly, people don’t want you to do things you’re not good at. Your friends aren’t going to ask you to cook for everyone in the AirBNB if the thing you’re best at cooking is proceeded with the word “Instant.”
If you want to be good at something, do it a lot.
People avoid or are dissuaded from doing things they’re not good at, and often don’t end up getting better. Still, this is not the path to improvement.
In a pottery class, the students were divided into two groups: Group A had to create one perfect bowl, while Group B had to make thirty bowls and weren’t graded on quality. In the end, Group B's bowls were more impressive because they learned more through trial and error.
I don’t know if this is true, I can’t source it, someone feel free to fact-check me. Even if this isn’t true, doesn’t it SOUND true2?
I can’t cook. It’s embarrassing. But, in an effort to thwart this insecurity, I decided to learn to poach an egg since it seemed sorta hard. I went to the supermarket, bought 18 eggs, and poached two eggs every morning until I could cook a perfect poached egg with a slightly running yolk. And it worked.
You can get better. You can do this without a mentor. You can do this without guidance. You can do it without showing anyone. It might be nice to have a teacher, that’s your call. But sometimes it’s nice just to do it on your own.
You can’t fail if no one saw you. Have you ever tripped in public? What do you do first? You look to see if anyone saw. If no one saw you carry on your merry way and barely care.
I don’t think one is necessarily going to become a master with this simple repetition process. That’s ok. Mere proficiency is sufficient for many skills.
I’ll concede if you’re already good at something, you probably need to spend more time perfecting, which is slower and more deliberate. You may need a coach to observe you. You may need to read more advanced techniques. But, if you’re not good, don’t worry! You most likely can’t get worse.
Practice. Practice. Practice.
Ruin eggs.
Get sweaty speaking a new language.
Throw ping pong balls into cups of water.
Get better if you want to, just keep trying.
This applies to many skills. Financial analysis. Creative work. Public speaking. The list is very long, and you can get better just by doing it a ton.
Have you ever tried to get better at something simply by doing it a lot? How’d it go? Share in the comments.
See, it’s still business. Also the reason I think I was terrible at beer pong is cause I didn’t really drink alcohol and thus didn’t really play alcohol games. It’s sad.
I’m very confident I heard this in a Tim Ferriss Podcast.