I recently finished Drive by Daniel Pink, it was an engaging read, that was difficult to put down until I was all the way through. The book highlights what we think motivates us versus what actually motivates us. It was striking how intuitive the methods for modern day motivation are but also more shocking is how often we do things counter to these motivators. I especially appreciate that Pink included a playbook at the end of the book that trains us on how to put his theories into action. I took away quite a few things that I intend to use in my own life. The biggest takeaway for me was his 3 laws of mastery, mastery being the urge to get better and better at something that matters. Whether you want to accelerate your career, improve in your hobby or build better relationships, these 3 laws can guide the way you think about and approach your own improvement and drive.
Mastery is a mindset
To start the journey to mastery in anything we have to have a desire. Fortunately for us, Pink points out that a mastery mindset isn’t something we are born with but rather something we develop. This means that anyone can learn the discipline of mastery if they are willing to put in the time and the effort.
Mastery is a pain
Anything worth doing will take extraordinary effort. We will need to face and push through our fears and weaknesses. The biggest thing I learned from this section is often when we start off on the journey is mastering something new, we forget how hard it will be. We don’t do a good job of transferring the pain we felt in doing other things onto this new venture. After we have found some level of success or skill in a domain we tend to look back with a tilted point of view and forget all the struggles we faced. If we can reflect on those trying times and what we learned from them, we will not be shocked when we face new adversity and it will give us motivation to press on.
Mastery is an asymptote
This is the realization that as much as we work, as hard as we try, as skilled as we get; we can never actually reach mastery. It is an ongoing journey, which looking back at mindset can be a great thing. This means that there is always room for growth, always room to get better. If you have a mastery faced mindset this fact will drive you to get better every day.
If these ideas have peaked your interest I would definitely encourage you to check out the book and Daniel Pink’s other great book To Sell Is Human
