I used to subscribe to a newsletter from James Clear1This is an admittedly great name for a self-help guru to have. I obliquely made fun of him here. I dropped the newsletter because he sent a lot of mail, the advice got very samey, and ultimately it gets fatiguing to constantly read platitudes about how to be a better person, blah blah blah.
He’s back!
I received an unsolicited email from him today2CleanShot X makes this look far classier than it did in reality:
I like the unspecified use of “top experts” in the above. What are they experts in? It doesn’t matter, they’re top experts! Trust me. Actually, let’s have a look:
- Serena Williams: Top expert at tennising
- Neil Gaiman: Top expert at writing
- Gordon Ramsay: Top expert at yelling
What “small behaviors3I’m using the American spelling here and my spell checker is getting mad at me” made these experts so expertful? Let’s see:
- Serena Williams: Has probably played five thousand million hours of tennis
- Neil Gamin: Has probably written five thousand million words
- Gordon Ramsay: Has probably yelled at five thousand million people
The key to become a class master (surely the goal of a MasterClass), then, is to spend an extraordinary amount of time doing the one thing you want to be an expert at. This is prime TED Talk stuff right here. Further, the small behaviors would seem to be:
- Find something you want to do (“I want to be an expert yak herder”)
- Spend an inordinate time doing that thing
- Top Expert!
Anyway, spoiler: I did not sign up to MasterClass™.
I already did, jerk!
