This awesome article from Cal Newport emphasizes the importance of deliberate, intelligent action and a relaxed, prioritized life.
He dissects a study on the differences between elite and average violin players at a prestigious academy.
“The three researchers subjected their subjects to a series of in-depth interviews. They then gave them diaries which divided each 24-hour period into 50 minute chunks, and sent them home to keep a careful log of how they spent their time.
Flush with data, the researchers went to work trying to answer a fundamental question: Why are the elite players better than the average players?”
Answer – not because of hours worked. The “1,000 hours of practice” meme is WRONG.
“The time diaries revealed that both groups spent, on average, the same number of hours on music per week (around 50).”
Rather, the experts were applying INTELLIGENCE to their practice time:
“The elite players were spending almost three times more hours than the average players on deliberate practice — the uncomfortable, methodical work of stretching your ability.”
DELIBERATE action is what Cyborganize encourages. REACTIVE action and busywork is what we do by default.
Timing is also important – there’s a natural rhythm that the best fall into:
“The average players, they discovered, spread their work throughout the day.”
“The elite players, by contrast, consolidated their work into two well-defined periods. When you plot the average time spent working versus the hours of the day for these players, there are two prominent peaks: one in the morning and one in the afternoon.
In fact, the more elite the player, the more pronounced the peaks. For the best of the best … there was essentially no deviation from a rigid two-sessions a day schedule.”
A relaxed life in which only important matters are deliberately tackled with available energy and focus, is the best life. When you free up your time, you naturally fall into your body’s optimal rhythm of work.
This has health and psychological benefits:
“the elite players slept an hour more per night than the average players.”
“the elite players were significantly more relaxed than the average players, and the best of the best were the most relaxed of all.”
Cyborganize permits you to live this life.