When we become skilled at something, it becomes automatic. We don’t have to think much about it, because our brain, running on virtual autopilot, is constantly making predictions—and most of its predictions are true.

As Ravi Kumar, president of the IT giant Infosys, describes it, “You have to learn to learn, learn to unlearn, and learn to re-learn.”

A man…progresses in all things by making a fool of himself.*1

—george bernard shaw

“Driving with background music,” one researcher speculated, “might be the most prevalent music behaviour ever taken on by the human species.”

Being a beginner is precisely about putting your status aside, about being willing to listen to and learn from others, about revealing your insecurities.

After he was fired from Apple, Steve Jobs wrote, “the heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything.” He soon enjoyed an intensely creative period.

1. We all have latent abilities that can be unlocked.

Learning a skill means doing the most with the least. Expert performers, we often say, “make it look easy.” This is for good reason.

You must become a beginner.

—rainer maria rilke