The Practice - Book Notes
Skills that aren't thought of as skills
Attitudes are skills.
Good taste is a skill.
Creation is more scarce than criticism
People rarely criticize the critic.
It’s a lot more difficult to use a bandsaw, or even to use a pencil to draw the plans in the first place. There’s a huge clue here about what to do next: get a pencil.
That’s what’s scarce. People who will draw up plans. People who will go first.
Creative Leadership
As a creative you lead without authority.
Instead, you rely on the wisdom of your insight and the desire you have to accept responsibility.
Not all Flow is equal
Consider two kinds of batting practice. In one, the pitches are chunked into categories—twenty-five fastballs, twenty-five curve balls—in a predictable rhythm. At the end of this practice, hitters reported feeling a sense of confidence and flow. The alternative involves mixing up the pitches randomly. Here, the batters reported frustration and less satisfaction.
But teacher Torre’ Mills points out that the random method, where desirable difficulty is at work, actually improves players’ skills more than the chunked approach.
When we intentionally avoid desirable difficulty, our practice suffers, because we’re only coasting.
Creativity is a choice
It’s not a bolt of lightning from somewhere else.
It all comes back to trusting our self to create the change we seek. We don’t agree to do that after flow arrives. We do the work, whether we feel like it or not, and then, without warning, flow can arise.
We become what we do
When we choose to act a certain way, our mind can’t help but rework our narrative to make those actions become coherent.
Infinite Games
Game we play to play, not to win:
- Relationships
- Parenting
- A craft (Design, Teaching, Carpentry)
- Friendships
