MASTER ONE THING! - PART 2 (OF 2)

Feb 20, 2008

In Part 1 of “Master One Thing,” we explored a wonderful quote by Quincy Jones. In his autobiography, he wrote, “Master one thing and it will take you around the world.” For those of you who were inspired to the point of shedding alone in a practice room for hours on end, way to go! Now that we have looked into some of the potential barriers to mastery, and the trap of being a “jack of all trades, master of none,” let’s take things to the next level.

Here are a few important things to know about the process of developing mastery. They are intended to serve as a road map to prevent you from getting lost along the way.

- It takes approximately 10,000 times of doing something to master it. As maestro Jon Robertson once told to me, “If you want to be good at something, do a lot of it!”

- The body and mind move at their own pace! Be patient and watch out for the tendency to criticize yourself. Mastery can’t be forced.

- There are four stages to mastery.

1st Stage: Unconscious Incompetence

Here, you don’t know that you don’t know that something exists or that you lack a particular skill. It would be like not knowing that music can be notated, and then one day discovering that it can.

2nd Stage: Conscious Incompetence

Sticking with our example of music notation. At this stage you are now aware that music can be notated, and that you lack the skill to do so. It’s at this level that you need to commit to learn and develop your skill in order to keep moving towards mastery.

3rd Stage: Conscious Competence

Having developed enough skill you can perform reliably, though you will need to concentrate in order to do so. At the level of ‘conscious competence’ notating
music would not yet be 'second nature' or 'automatic.'

4th stage: Unconscious Competence

This is Mastery! Here, notating music has become so practiced that it’s entered the unconscious parts of the brain. In other words, it has become “second nature.” Now that you know what to look out for, go ahead and do what Quincy tells us to do. Master one thing and let it take you around the world. Good luck and remember, have fun!

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