Beginners

The whole idea that there’s some sole passion that’s out there, or secretly within you, waiting to emerge and magically change your life is questionable.

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

In the Dreyfus model, novices live in a world of rules to be learned and followed. Getting to the “advanced beginner” stage requires actually applying those rules. This also means knowing when not to apply rules, or how to act when no rule seems to apply.

The adult brain, once believed to be hopelessly “fixed and immutable,” is now thought capable of much greater plasticity than ever before.

As Winston Churchill wrote in his small, delightful book Painting as a Pastime, “It may well be that those whose work is their pleasure are those who most need the means of banishing it at intervals from their minds.”

The problem with beginners is that they’re always thinking about themselves doing the skill.

You should cherish this moment: The gains you make early will far exceed those you make later.

Here’s one advantage of being a perpetual beginner: Rather than grinding out a marathon, you are putting your brain through a variety of high-intensity interval workouts. Each time you begin to learn that new skill, you’re reshaping. You’re training your brain again to be more efficient.

Babies are constantly facing a new normal. Hard-and-fast rules about what works and what doesn’t will be of little use.