Do you have a goal you want to achieve?
Maybe you have been dancing for a while and feel like you’re spinning you’re wheels and not ‘getting better’?
Maybe you’ve heard that it takes 10,000 hours to achieve mastery of something? Do you have that kind of time? Most of us don’t, still we want the result We want to achieve!
Here is my story and how hope to help inspire you!
I’ve been dancing for 18 years now and easily logged close to 30.000 hours on the dance floor! I know a thing or two about the learning process and developing skill. Whats better is that I still learn more more everyday! Over the past 10 years my passion has shifted a desire to master dancing for myself to one of utilizing my skills as a teacher to helping others achieve theirs!
Along the way I have worked with amazing coaches, listened to hundreds of talks and read literally dozens of books on human performance. I have tracked down not only the best selling books but also researched the rather dry research work that went into those books. Although the research saying that it takes 10,000 hours to reach the top of an ultra competitive field is solid, most of us don’t need that level of skill development. We just to become proficient.
Just a few of the book I’ve read on the subject.
Recently a student (one who got good very quickly i might add) forwarded me a fantastic TedTalk that summarizes what I have learned about the learning process in a very compelling and inspiring way! In his talk John Kaufman deconstructs the first 20 hours of the learning process and breaks it apart into 4 parts.
So here is my challenge of 20! Give yourself 20 minutes to watch this Ted Talk, then promise yourself you will you commit the 20 hours of deliberate practice required to achieve your goal! I promise. I’ve read the research. I’ve done it myself in many things in my life and I’ve watched it happen for dozens of dancers in my studio. If your goal is centered around dancing… I’m here to help! Dancing has been amazing to me and I want nothing more that than
Years ago I remember reading that there are 250,000 words in the english language. Learning that many words is an almost insurmountable task! However the 25 most common of those words make up about 1/3 of all printed material. The first 100 most common comprise 1/2 of all written material, and the first 300 make up about 65% percent of all written material. See where I’m going? I learned that if we focus on the right things we can learn anything rather quickly! But how quickly???
“Mate, at this stage of my career I’m more of a cheerleader. I just encourage people” -Famous ballroom & latin coach Ray Rivers to me
The beginning phase of learning a new skill is so awkward that most people simply can’t handle it emotionally. They feel awkward being so far outside of their comfort zone that its easier to quit than to deal with the sheer uncomfortablenss that comes with learning. Thats when the words of the great ballroom & latin coach Ray Rivers came to me. See Ray has been dancing since the 1950’s. Thats a LONG time and he is an expert to the experts. Before a lesson one day he said to me, that after 50 years of dancing he had become more of a ‘cheerleader’ than anything else. Thats when it started to make sense to me. My roll as a teacher was more to encourage people.
How long will I be a cheerleader? I wondered.
Having taught dancers from scratch to the professional level I knew that what I was teaching was technically correct. Having worked with so many brilliant coaches over the years I knew that how I was communicating that material was correct as well. It just didn’t seem to work for everyone. There needed to be some sort of minor shift in my understanding. I became convinced that the hardest part of my job was convincing people to not quit on themselves.
“If you know the way broadly you will see it in everything.” – Miyamoto Musashi
As a teacher I felt that! When a student walked in that had previously learned to say, fly a plan, or gone thought medical school, or learn a martial art, those people seemed to stick to dancing more easily than others. For the people who had previously gone through the uncomfortable struggle of learning something new, those were the one who seemed to succeed at dancing. They understood the process. My struggle became “how do I get people to invest their time?” I needed them invested for just long enough to get over the initial uncomfortable part of learning something new.
Recently a student (one who got pretty good pretty quickly) forwarded me a fantastic TedTalk that summarizes what I have learned about the learning process in a very compelling and inspiring way! So here is my challenge of 20! Give yourself 20 minutes to watch this Ted Talk, then promise yourself you will you commit the 20 hours of deliberate practice required to achieve your goal! I promise. I’ve read the research. I’ve done it myself in many things in my life and I’ve watched it happen for dozens of dancers in my studio. If your goal is centered around dancing… I’m here to help! Dancing has been amazing to me and I want nothing more that than
