[book] Peak, Anders Ericsson (9/10)

[Paul McCarthy]

At the bottom of this post, I have embedded a 13 minute video describing what I learnt from this book.

 

Summary:-

This book is one of my favorite books because it's a really deep look into what makes high performance. Anders Ericsson is the expert on experts - he's dedicated decades of his life to researching how people become amazing at stuff.

The bottom line, and the key takeaway, is that we have a lot more control over our performance than we think.  

Verdict: Definitely worth reading.  I've read a bunch of books relating to performance including (Outliers, Talent is Overrated, So Good they Can't Ignore You, Mindset, Grit) and this is the one I'd recommend above all of them (although they all have golden nuggets in them).

 

Point 1 - High Performance is Under our Control

In all his years of research and study, he's never found a single high performer who hasn't spent hours and hours practicing on their craft - there simply hasn't been a single instance of a so-called prodegy, or a natural.  

He's found that mastery is a result of time spend practicing.  

But it's not just any old practice that creates exceptional performance. There are actually three different types of practice, and they're not all equal.

 

Point 2 - The Three Different Types of Practice.

Naive practice

This is akin to doing the same thing over and over again and hoping that you'll get better once you put in the hours. This is like playing the same song on the piano repetitively or jogging at the same speed that you always jog when you exercise. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. In fact, it's worse than that - studies in some areas (one example is doctors) actually show that if you do things "automatically" on a repetitive basis, then you can actually perform worse over time. 

Purposeful practice

This is a step up. This is where you break down what you're trying to get better at into small skills and create specific goals to practice them. You focus hard - this isn't automatic and it requires concentration. You won't enjoy it and you'll be mentally exhausted after a few hours. Even top musicians can only do this for a maximum of four hours per day. Finally you keep trying to do things that you can't already do. You're trying to work just beyond the boundary of your current limits. This kind of practice works really well... but it can be optimised even further.

Deliberate Practice

The gold standard of practice is deliberate practice. This is purposeful practice but with the addition of an expert coach. The coach should give immediate feedback on the student's efforts. Deliberate practice is the fastest and most efficient method we currently know to get better at anything. It's what we should strive for.

 

Point 3 - Why Deliberate Practice Works so well

If you do deliberate practice for long enough, you develop mental representations which allow you to retain and process a huge amount of information automatically and do things that other untrained humans can't. These mental representations are extremely powerful - they trump everything - even intelligence. They're so powerful that to untrained individuals, the abilities seem almost superhuman.

 

Conclusions to be Taken Away from this Book

My conclusion from reading this book is that we all have a gift. The gift is that we get to decide what we want to be good at, apply deliberate practice, and get good at it.  

 

My Video Explanation of this Book

 

Edited March 24, 2017 by Paul McCarthy

[BjarkeT]

Awesome review

which book do you think that is your favorite on high performance?

kind regards

[Paul McCarthy]

If you only want to read one book on the subject, then read this book.  

If, however, you want to completely immerse yourself in the belief that we have far more control over our ability than most of us realise, then read all of these (I've linked to my notes for the high level summaries of some of the books):-

• Grit - Angela Duckworth (http://www.evernote.com/l/AL07elDGyIJDppA3Xunkb58LD8oGqjlkSyo/)
• Mindset - Carol Dweck (http://www.evernote.com/l/AL0yWEwuWJZDlJr76d0f_PgtpcgtSWtl2Kc/)
• Talent is Overrated - Geoff Colvin (http://www.evernote.com/l/AL3_SoW1_pBBv6P3tODkCNUSh6hRR0FZVLY/)
• Outliers - Malcolm Gladwell
• So Good They Can't Ignore You - Cal Newport (http://www.evernote.com/l/AL2gGVOsbTVPUZSiTrqGRmg28FpaWVEA718/)
• Mastery - Robert Greene

Here are my notes for this book, Peak:  http://www.evernote.com/l/AL01yTpyVahIaL8sjYv3NLSTJvwZDhska-E/

Hope it helps!

Edited March 24, 2017 by Paul McCarthy

[BjarkeT]

Thanks for the suggestion

i am really interested in how to be really good at something

if you are interested i have found a few books on topic too

1: deep work by calnewport

2: top performer course by scott h young and calnewport

3: the talent code by dainel coyle

4: the power of the full engagement by Tony Schwartz

5: rapid learner by scott h young

6: The Little Book of Talent: 52 Tips for Improving Your Skills by dainel coyle

7: The Road To Excellence: the Acquisition of Expert Performance in the Arts and Sciences, Sports, and Games By K. Anders Ericsson

i have only read deep work so far but plan to read the others too

thanks for your reply

kind regards