Good to Great

It's such a trap to look at the work of some top creators. It can feel inspiring and admirable, but it can evoke extreme emotions.

On one hand, you set a high bar because that's the type of content that catches your eye. This creates pressure and a certain level of expectation for yourself. So you roll up your sleeves and do the work. Iterate, iterate, iterate. And just one creation takes a long time, so much so that it becomes discouraging.

The other extreme is just a shortcut to the same outcome. You feel like the bar is so high that no matter the work you put in, you'll never get there.

I can't recall where I read this specific example but a visual creator was asked how to get to their level of quality. Many people would often go up to him at events with a similar question. The problem in most cases is that they want to jump to high-quality creation from the beginning. This is not only harmful but also unrealistic. I enjoy MKBHD's content and if you look at his very first videos, they were simple, with no crazy equipment, but that didn't stop him. He was genuine from day 1 and iterated to become the successful creator he is now. That's a whole journey though, which is the point of how to get from good to great.

If you look at what's covered by "Mastery" or "The Talent Code" there's a pattern of dedication and consistency.

There's no shortcut to becoming great at something, you have to do it a lot.

The deliberate nature of your work can help get to your destination faster:

• tackle areas you know you're weak on
• read and learn from books that stood the test of time
• observe others who reached the level you hope to be at

Especially today we're in an era with an astounding amount of tools at our disposal to learn and grow.

Thoughts

I find it funny that it was an episode of "Hot Ones" to inspire this thought. As I looked at the simple format and the quality of Sean Evan's questions, it is remarkable how he and the rest of the team have been able to produce such high-quality content for so long. This made me reflect on one of the reasons why I tried to build this writing habit. I enjoy the process, I know I'm not great at it, but I hope to get better at it, and I'm aware it will take time. I never committed to it as much as I did this year and started to pick up books about writing. Some of the suggestions from "On Writing Well" stayed with me and some faded away. I plan on picking that up again, along with "Writing for Busy Readers". The goal is to develop a framework for writing better until it becomes second nature.