Focus On The First 20 Hours Not the Other 9,980 Hours

 

If you want to understand the concept of friction, just read anything about how it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at something. If you want to destroy someone’s motivation, mention that little tidbit.

A couple of years ago, I came across this Forbes’ interview of Josh Kaufman, who espouses that it takes 20 hours to learn a new skill. For some people, even that’s a lot of time but it sure ain’t 10,000 hours.

Of course, we are talking about two different things here – learning a new skill versus becoming an expert at it. Based on apparent research, both are correct. However, everyone needs to think and start small. 10,000 hours is not small.

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A Great Piece of Advice from Arianna Huffington

“You can actually complete a project by dropping it.” – Arianna Huffington

I could try to write a full blown blog post about wasting time but luckily, I don’t have to. I’d rather be efficient and refer to this keynote by Arianna Huffington a couple of years ago that I was lucky enough to attend.

Jump to the 17:53 mark to get to my favorite part of her talk although if you have the time, I found many great nuggets of wisdom throughout.

The only thing I will add personally to her keynote is that there are many people out there telling you do something or use something to help you improve your life (including yours truly).

Try it. But if it doesn’t work for you, shut it down. Find something else that works for you.

Why do you think there are multitudes of successful to-do list applications? Should you use Todoist or Wunderlist or 2Do or ToodleDo or Any.Do or Google Keep or OneNote or Remember the Milk or OmniFocus?

They all can share market space because we all work differently.

As Arianna says, drop things with clarity. If you know it doesn’t work for you, no matter how many people you trust suggest you try it, dump it.

By not continuing to waste your time, you ultimately save time.