(no subject)

[lethargic_man]

I have read, in more than one place, that you can't become expert in anything without putting in I think it was ten thousand hours of practice. (To the objection "what about child prodigies like Mozart or Stevie Wonder?", the response was given that they were only prodigious as children for their age: had Mozart died as a child, no one would remember him today.)

I find this rather depressing: it means that I will now almost certainly never become an expert at anything again (except, probably, at work): I don't have the willpower to climb that hill again in my spare time. Certainly not after seeing the dream I poured thousands upon thousands of hours into in my teens and twenties deliver next to zero results.

*sigh* Is it really all downhill from here?

Discuss. [20 marks]

Comments

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

I thought you are master of your profession.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

I did except work at the top. I also said I would not become an expert at anything else; not that I'm not an expert at anything now. But it wasn't really work I was thinking of. (And even then, I'm only an expert in a very narrow field; in the wider realm of software engineering I don't regard myself as outstanding.)