10K hours to master anything is BS! The first actions and hours are critical

We’ve all heard it before, 10 000 hours to master anything. It sounds great but it’s also horribly oversimplified and simply not true!

We’ve all been there. We’ve decided on the next BIG thing in our lives… learning guitar, doing a presentation in front of hundreds, starting a new successful business…

It’s what we do next that really matters… imagine we’ve covered the absolute basics, we have a guitar, we have volunteered to do the presentation, have our business idea.

Now the possibilities of next steps is INFINTE… and this is where the 10K rule breaks down. Let’s take new business idea. We can browse the bookstore for books on how to start a business, we could spend WEEKS building a website for our business, we can make business cards. You could get pretty close to 10K hours but not sell a single thing, I’ve been there!

If we instead focus on the outcome, starting a new successful business and we imagine we were given advice to our best friend. We may say something along the lines of –

·       Talk to potential customers – Does this idea even have legs?

·       Brainstorm solutions – How can you genuinely solve their problem?

·       Test assumptions – Build a scrappy prototype.

·       Gauge demand – Would people actually pay for it?

·       Sell, learn, tweak, repeat – Keep going until you get a “yes.”

So why don’t we follow our own intuition or guidance we would give someone we care about?

FEAR, OVERTHINKING, BLOCKERS, PATTERNS OF THINKING… that’s what!

Want to test it? If you want to do a presentation in front of hundreds, what stops you just volunteering to speak at your next company town hall and just doing it?

What stops you approaching someone who has just walked out the gym to talk to them about a new energy drink or supplement you want to develop?

We all get it… we talk about nerves, butterflies… something almost literally stopping us from doing something. Why does this happen?

When we want to something different or outside of our usual patterns and behaviour it must get past our lower brain or our ‘chimp brain’… it’s that brutal part of our brain designed to keep us safe… if it can’t see any value and only risk in the action or behaviour then it’s a strong NO! And believe me when I say the chimp is by FAR the stronger dog in this fight, you will lose every single time!

So how do we get past the chimp bouncer and onto the dancefloor of action?

You must ensure that you GENUIENLY and HONESTLY feel safe about the next step you are considering. If doing a presentation in front of hundreds genuinely terrifies you and is too far outside your comfort zone what about 50 people, no? 20? … maybe… 10? YES! I could do it!

GREAT go for it, learn from it but most importantly DO NOT THINK about the step after it!! Just focus on that step. Every successful sports team takes it one game at a time for a good reason!

When we feel safe and we take small steps forward we figure out that that’s the hardest part of all. Those first few hours will set the course for the rest of the journey to the outcome. Forget about the 10K hours instead focus on the first few critical hours that set your course. Be kind to yourself, build your confidence and keep building from there. There is only one guaranteed way of not achieving your outcome and that’s stopping trying and building!

Struggling to take that first step? You're not alone—but you don’t have to figure it out by yourself. If you’re ready to break through fear, build momentum, and actually make progress toward your goals, I can help.

🚀 Let’s get you moving. Visit adrianrichardson.org to learn more!