Mastery
In this book, There are some ways to Master in the field you want. The author of this book "George Leonard" had shared some disciplined things of Aikedo Martial Arts form. These tips are not only to Master martial arts, these can be used for any purpose for learning things. I suggest you to read this book of amazing journey called Mastery.
Stats for nerds
25recommend
40mentions
32people
2008–2025years
78% recommend23% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- I have actually won against doomscroll. I used to spend 5-6 hours per day, and it peaked at 10 hours per day for some days of the year.
I realized that doomscrolling is not only clever algorithms trying to get me hooked, but also a symptom of deeper problems that I had.
And I realized that I was unhappy because I spent most of my doing things that I didn't like. I was deep frustrated. I did not want to spend my brain's precious energy on doing things that I didn't want to do.
I changed my path. Stopped caring about outside forces. Became happier. This was the hard part.
The easy part is what I learned from Cal Newport's book "Deep Work". It asks you to implement timeblocks. I implemented a 20 minute timeblock for browsing social media. I would not touch social media outside that timeblock. It really worked. I implemented timeblocks for studying, coding, personal time, and the resistance towards doing these things weathered away once I started. So, the urge to doomscroll went down, too.
I read some books, and consumed other resources that talk about our mind and our brain. Also some books on Theraveda Buddhist teachings. When you see your "self" as a bunch of neurons contextualised by your environment, outer stimuli, and as these are bound by biological laws, you stop being hard on yourself. You forgive yourself, gently. Then managing emotions, urges, etc. become easier.
Reducing the number of apps that you use also reduces time spend in doomscroll. I gave up Facebook 4 years ago because the content was too low quality, and gave up Quora some months ago for the same reason. Now all I have is Reddit. I keep Facebook as a non-professional networking too. I open it if I have something to say to particular someone, and spend maybe 10 minutes per month on it.
I also started meditating. That also helped big time. I will highly recommend it. Books that helped-
- What the Buddha Taught by Walpola Rahula
- Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana
- Why Buddhism is True by Robert Wright
- Mastery by Gordon Leonard
- Learning How to Learn (Coursera)
- Mind Illuminated by Culadasa
- Atomic Habits by James Clear
- Pragmatic Thinking and Learning by Andy Hunt
- There has only been three books so far that have changed my life-
1. "Sei Somoy" (Those Times) by Sunil Ganguly. It is a novel about the past of Bengalis. The Bengali Reneissance, its central characters, progress, the conflict- all are beautifully depicted. I had no collective identity as a person before. And disliked whatever I had. This book made me feel really good about my identity. Suddenly, I was more confident in a conscious way, and did things better.
2. "Maitreya Jatak" by Bani Basu. Buddha is a human character in this novel. And so is the time and place of India. The pre-big-Empire India is beautifully depicted. I got deeply interested in Buddha and that opened a new path of life for me, which transformed my life.
3. "Godel, Escher, Bach"- learned deeply about logic and its limitations. How human constructs such as mathematical symbols and human languages- all are so limited. Completely changed me as a person and gave me a new outlook.
There are other books that did not change my life completely, but added layers to my perception and thinking.
1. "The Black Swan" by N. Nicholas Taleb. It has added a filter to my entire thought process. I call it the Nicholas filter.
2. "Innovators" by Walter Isaacson. Learned about computer history, collaboration. The idea of " collaboration through time" got really etched into me.
3. "The Little Schemer", 4e and Graham Hutton's Haskell book made me a better programmer in ways I did not expect.
4. Strangly, Neal Stephenson's " Cryptonomicon" has taught me to never waste my time on entertainment or learning that is not fully ideal. The idea that something so profoundly good can exist for people like us, convinced me to read only very high quality literature of all kinds and sci-fi of only the highest kind. Also made me give up watching TV/web series to a large degree. I don’t compromise with the quality of entertainment that I consume anymore. I consume only the best and most desired things.
5. "Mastery" by Leonard Gordon has, above all, taught me that a boring life should be desired where the brain's desire for novelty is not awarded, and instead, time is spent on honing much fewer number of skills.
6. "Deep Work" by Cal Newport has really helped me with my productivity and happiness, and made me give up social media. Same goes for "Pragmatic Thinking and Learning" by Andy Hunt.
7. "Atomic Habits" by James Clear has been effective in many ways of my life.
8. "Mindfulness in Plain English", "The Mind Illuminated", and " What the Buddha Taught" have made me a better human- in all aspects. As if my character's level has been upped in the video game of the world.
9. "Fundamentals of Physics" by Halliday, Resnick, and Walker and my whole familiarity with Feynman through Feynman Lactures and recorded lectures made me intolerant towards dry learning materials. Now, I use learning material that are not marely useful, but also overly entertaining.
- If you haven’t already, try reading Mastery by George Leonard. Some of his examples / narrative choices are dated but if you can look past that it’s got great insights. It’s a piece of the puzzle but can provide some orientation.
- jonathan Livinsgton Seagull and Illusions Both by Richard Bach were very influential in my late twenties. In mY thirties I was glad I found Mastery by George Leonard. All three of them less than 100 pages to close to 100 pages.
- The 9 books mentioned in the video are as follows:
1. Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki
2. The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss
3. How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
4. The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene
5. The Way of the Superior Man by David Deida
6. Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
7. Mastery by George Leonard
8. Mindfulness for Beginners by Jon Kabat-Zinn
9. The Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday
- See Mastery by George Leonard
which is a great book and highly recommended
even if you are not into karate or martial arts.
You have echoed his sketch of punctuated plateaus (p14):
The Mastery Curve
[pdf] http://index-of.co.uk/Social-Interactions/Mastery%20-%20The%...There's really no way around it. Learning any new skill involves relatively brief spurts of progress, each of which is followed by a slight decline to a plateau somewhat higher in most cases than that which preceded it.
