Denny Strecker's Blog

Habits and Skills

When trying to reach your goals, remember that you have to acquire the right habits BEFORE you develop the necessary skills.

Often people fail because they work on skills first. Let's say you are learning to play a musical instrument.

You begin by practicing each day. You struggle with the exercises the teacher has given you.

You are serious about learning…and so you expect a lot of yourself.

However, because these skills are difficult to master, you become frustrated and eventually quit your practice sessions.

 You made the mistake of trying something difficult without having the proper habits in place.

A better approach would have been to practice for a brief amount of time each day…without putting any pressure on yourself to improve.

Bang away at the keys;  play your favorite parts of songs you do know;  make up stuff…in short, have fun.

Stick to this approach for thirty, sixty, or maybe even ninety days…until the HABIT of practicing is firmly embedded in your routine.

Skills will automatically follow!
 

This entry was posted on Monday, October 26th, 2009 at 10:39 am and is filed under Self-Improvement. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.