Saturday, November 14, 2015

Law of 10000 hrs - from Sachin to Gates!

When I was small, my dad told me while making me do maths problems - " Practice makes a man perfect". I didn't bother that much and worked on problems multiple times and used to remember...however didn't find any profoundness in that statement.

Years later, I read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell and got this concept of 10,000 hrs - if you spend 10,000 hours of practice on a skill, you become a master in that.

And for example, author quoted Bill Gates. Behind the fact that bill was able to build Microsoft so successfully, lies a veil of circumstances and his personal interest that made him do 10000 hrs of programming so earlier in his life.

He was staying near a university which had a mainframe computer, and had access to it in his school years. Out of his interest, he used to write a program and used to punch his cards in university. For kids his age, it was next to impossible that they were given access to a mainframe. Thus, his passion for programming + circumstances made him do 10000 hrs of programming and master it without anyone of his age  remotely can even wonder! That's the secret behind his success.

And today, when I think of this law, I draw multiple living examples.

Why Sachin Tendulkar was God of cricket? Technique, passion yes! But I think, somewhere I read that he used to play a lot in gully in his neighbourhood and because of narrow lane, only way you can score runs was straight. And that is why he did 10000 hrs of straight drive so early that he was way ahead of Kids his age. And yes, a great straight drive, does a great deal for your cricketing technique!

And yes, there are many more who grow up playing in lanes, but I think there comes the fact of passion and ignite to go single minded in a direction and make it happen.

Building a life myself with my kid,...all this makes a great sense!

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