Book Byte #163 "Bounce" by Matthew Syed
Mozart, Federer, Picasso, Beckham, and the Science of Success
📣 Curious Quote from the Author
“Well, it doesn’t work. Lowering standards just leads to poorly educated students who feel entitled to easy work and lavish praise.”
“Child prodigies amaze us because we compare them not with other performers who have practiced for the same length of time, but with children of the same age who have not dedicated their lives in the same way. We delude ourselves into thinking they possess miraculous talents because we assess their skills in a context that misses the essential point. We see their little bodies and cute faces and forget that, hidden within their skulls, their brains have been sculpted—and their knowledge deepened—by practice that few people accumulate until well into adulthood, if then. Had the six-year-old Mozart been compared with musicians who had clocked up 3,500 hours of practice, rather than with other children of the same age, he would not have seemed exceptional at all.”
“The extraordinary dedication of the young Mozart, under the guidance of his father, is perhaps most powerfully articulated by Michael Howe, a psychologist at the University of Exeter, in his book Genius Explained. He estimates that Mozart had clocked up an eye-watering 3,500 hours of practice even before his sixth birthday.”
“When most people practice, they focus on the things they can do effortlessly,” Ericsson has said. “Expert practice is different. It entails considerable, specific, and sustained efforts to do something you can’t do well—or even at all. Research across domains shows that it is only by working at what you can’t do that you turn into the expert you want to become.” So far the focus in this book has been on the quantity of practice required to reach the top, and we’ve seen that it’s a staggering amount of time, stretching for a period of at least ten years.”
“Later doesn’t always come to everybody.”
“The subversive idea at the centre of Ericsson’s work is that excellence is not reserved for the lucky few but can be achieved by almost all of us.”
“The idea that the Creator is on your side, guiding your footsteps, taking a personal interest in your troubles, deriving pleasure from your victories, providing solace in your defeats, orchestrating the world such that, in the words of Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, ‘All things work together for good to those who love God’ – all this must have a dramatic impact on the efficacy of a sportsman, or indeed anyone else. As Muhammad”
“If you don’t know what you are doing wrong, you can never know what you are doing right.”
“It is only by starting at an unusually young age and by practicing with such ferocious devotion that it is possible to accumulate ten thousand hours while still in adolescence. Far from being an exception to the ten-thousand-hour rule, Mozart is a shining testament to it.”
“So the question is: How long do you need to practice in order to achieve excellence? Extensive research, it turns out, has come up with a very specific answer to that question: from art to science and from board games to tennis, it has been found that a minimum of ten years is required to reach world-class status in any complex task.”
“That is partly why the stories are so compelling: they are individual, inimitable, highly specific to a given person at a given point in time. The sparks are, in a very real sense, mysterious, sometimes even to the people ignited by them.”
📚 Cognition of the Book’s Big Idea
It takes purposeful and persistent practice rather than the appropriate genes to succeed in a sector. The more you practice and push yourself to the limit, the more your brain will change how it handles the current task. However, attitude is also important; you have to learn from your mistakes and have faith that practice will turn you into a master.
Practical suggestions from this book:
Give your kids credit for their efforts rather than their skill.
Praise your kids for their dedication and endurance in practicing rather than their gifts if you want them to reach their full potential.
View things in a larger context to prevent choking
The next time an impending test or competition of any type makes you nervous, try putting it in perspective and ask yourself how significant it is in comparison to the most significant relationships in your life.
🛠️Fixing the Tech Industry
Success is a universal desire among everyone that lives on this Earth. Not only is it a strong desire built into every living being, it’s one of the main desires we share teh most. Competition leads to more Competition, we never can get enough success. However, for everyone one person that wins, a lot of others must lose. That’s why if you can provide a win/win scenario for your colleagues and clients, they will love you and basically do anything you ask them too. It’s the ultimate scenario outcome in Business and your Career.
🤝Collaborate with others with this Social Media Prompt:
How can you make your Career situation into a Win/Win Scenario for both you and your Company?
My Software Stack: I use Skool for my Online Community Platform and ClickFunnels for my Landing Pages, Payments, and Email Sequencing. I use Substack for my Newsletter and Taskade for AI Note Taking/Second Brain/Project Management. I use my Personal Amazon Store for Tech and Book Recommendations.
Try out the "Think and Grow Rich Challenge" by Russell Brunson and Learn more about the First Self Help Author Napoleon Hill