Second And Park — Web Copy That Works by Tiffani Jones

If you want to get better at something–say writing or playing tennis–there are a ton of ways to build your skills:

You can take a class. Wake up every morning at 6am and meditate. Read books. Interview experts. Get an entry-level job in the field. Be a genius.

Yet, no matter what asymptotic magic tricks you stumble upon, there’s no substitute for good, old-fashioned practice makes perfect. True experts–the real-deal human beings who shake things up in the world–are not simply shrewd managers of super-advanced strategies for success. And though it certainly helps, they aren’t always gifted with lucky breaks early on, either. And they’re rarely geniuses. More than anything else, experts are hard-working people who practice a lot.

I love this bit from Malcom Gladwell’s [Outliers](http://www.gladwell.com/outliers/index.html). (Get the book, by the way. You’ll read it in two days.):

The idea that excellence at performing a complex task requires a critical minimal level of practice surfaces again and again in studies of expertise. In fact, researchers have settled on what they believe is the magic number for true expertise: ten thousand hours.

The emerging picture from such studies is that ten thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world-class expert–in anything,” writes the neurologist Daniel Levitin. “In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, and what have you, this number comes up again and again…No one has yet found a case in which true world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery…This is true even of people we think of as prodigies.

I frequently hear folks talk about people they view as successful with a sense of awe and disbelief. They say things like, “X is just…a genius” Or “I don’t understand how they do it…it’s just, like, effortless.” This language signals a sad, weird projection of our deepest and worst fears: that success only comes to the naturally gifted, lucky few. We then convince ourselves to tap out.

There is a kernel, but only a kernel, of truth in this fear: Gifted folks have an easier time, and therefore experience more rewards, to begin with. In instances where early, more frequent rewards motivate people to practice, the cycle of greatness is self-perpetuating. But the idea that the majority of experts even fit into the “gifted and talented” category is preposterous and damaging. I call shenanigans.

If you really want to go there, it’s possible for anyone to achieve get-famous mastery in 5 years, assuming you work 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. Or, if you’re like me and prefer a more moderate rendering of the lesson: Set up conditions so that you can practice often, and you’ll get where you want to be–no matter how late in the game you join.