Long Term Thinking: The Key To Mastery

Things happen in their own time, not when you want them to – Lau Tzu, Tao Ching

If there was one thing I would like to go back in time and tell my younger self it’s to think long term. In this blog, I’m going to explain why long term thinking is the key to mastery. It is one of the most important concepts I have learned in my lifetime – and I only wish I had learned it earlier.

In their book Working Out, Working Within, Jerry Lynch and Chungliang Al Huang share a terrific anecdote. A young runner asks her coach how long it will take her to become a world class runner if she trains hard, eats right, etc…. Her coach answers: “Four or five years.” “What if I train twice as hard?” “Ten to twelve,” responds the coach.

No pain, no gain. Only the paranoid survive. Work hard, play hard. We live in a culture that is obsessed with getting results fast. Unfortunately, the process of mastery takes time and trying to rush the process paradoxically only makes it take longer – or prevents you from ever achieving it at all.

In his book Mastery, George Leonard described four archetypes for the way people approach skill acquisition: The Dabbler, The Hacker, The Obsessive and The Master.

The Dabbler tries this and that but is never willing to put in the time and effort that mastery requires. When he doesn’t see the results he wants, he quits and moves on to another pursuit.

The Hacker puts in some effort at the start, reaches a certain level of competence with which he is happy and makes no further progress. He stays within his comfort zone, makes the minimal effort needed to stay afloat and never progresses beyond the beginner stage.

The Obsessive is at the opposite end of the spectrum from The Dabbler and The Hacker. The Obsessive is determined to be great and is willing to give it everything he has. But he lacks patience, pushes too hard and as a result runs into repeated burnout, setbacks and injuries. His progress is characterized by spurts of growth followed by setbacks that require a lot of time and effort to recover from. Because he lacks the patience to allow things to develop at their natural pace and instead tries to force them to happen according to his will, The Obsessive is continually thwarted by his inability to stay in tune with the rhythm of growth.

The Master has the same drive to be great as The Obsessive but also the wisdom to pace himself in line with the nature of growth. Because he can discipline his drive, he can slow down and make adjustments when needed. Instead of continually banging his head against a brick wall like The Obsessive, The Master embraces the process of growth over time. He doesn’t try to force things to happen but allows things to progress according to natural laws.

For all of my life up until recently, I have been an Obsessive. I have relentlessly pushed myself to the limit time and again, only to see all my progress lost as a result of burnout, illness or injury – only to repeat the pattern again and again.

It’s important to understand that the archetypes outlined here and the process of mastery don’t apply only to physical training. They apply to any pursuit of skill: investing, poker, career development, etc… To win at life you must learn to play the long game.