Back in high school my track coach would often get on me about my sloppy block practice. He’d say “You aren’t setting up in the blocks properly. You’re rushing it, just going through the motions.” I’d say “Why does it matter right now? I’m not racing anyone today. I’ll do it right at the meet this weekend.”
“I’ll tell you why it matters” he’d say, sternly. “You play like you practice. Practice sloppy and you’ll play sloppy.”
You’ll play like you practice. You’re not going to be sharp unless you practice being sharp. I’ve heard this again over the years.
A few years ago I took a self-defense class. At one point in the class, we worked with fake handguns. We each had a partner and we had to work on scenarios where a gun might be involved.
The instructor repeatedly said, “When your turn is over, do not hand the gun to your partner. Instead, they’ll turn their back, and you’ll just drop it on the ground so they can pick it up and start the exercise over.”
That sounded weird. You’re right next to the person, why would you drop the gun so they had to pick it up?
Without having to ask why, the instructor explained himself: “If you practice handing the gun over to your partner now, you might end up handing the gun over to an actual assailant later. Don’t laugh, I’ve seen it happen.” Then he showed us surveillance camera footage of someone doing it in robbery.
It sounded ridiculous. Why would I ever give my gun to someone who’s attacking me? The answer is because if I practiced doing that earlier, I might do it later.
When humans are in stressful situations, we tend to fall back on our practice. If I practiced handing my gun over, I might mindlessly fall back on that when it mattered most. That would be bad.
Skip steps now, you’ll skip them later. Cut corners now, you’ll cut them later. You get used to what you do most of the time.
Des Traynor
on 15 Apr 13“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” — Aristotle
dreed
on 15 Apr 13amateurs practice until they get it right.. professionals practice until they can’t get it wrong.
Jason Fried
on 15 Apr 13Des: That’s one of my favorite quotes.
Jason Windsor
on 15 Apr 13I played violin in orchestra in high school. A fellow violinist felt one of our pieces needed a four-note tag at the end, and played her tag at all of our rehearsals. It became a joke, but the closer we got to our concert, the teacher asked her to stop so that she wouldn’t play it in front of an audience. (Improvised solos from a lone second violinist isn’t exactly encouraged in an orchestra situation.) Naturally, when the time came, she played it, and the teacher gave her a nasty look that has been etched into my memory for these last 18 years. It taught me that muscle memory is exceedingly powerful, which is why rehearsal is so important and valuable, and training your hands (or feet, or mind) to do the right things early and often can elevate you above your natural talent, and practicing things incorrectly can render talent irrelevant.
I’ve led and played in a lot of bands since, and they hate me when I insist on getting it right, but love the feeling of doing things perfectly when it matters.
Brandon
on 15 Apr 13Your post really rings true with me for giving presentations. I used to skip over rehearsing for real and more or less “paraphrasing” what I was going to say. I paraphrased because I felt stupid really getting into it, in front of an empty room.
Guess what? If you feel stupid in front of the empty room, wait until its full of people!
Christian
on 15 Apr 13A friend of mine, who is an active member of the Canadian Military Forces, terms this as “Going into the black”. A point where (when under extreme stress) your mind goes blank and your training kicks in.
During a tour in Afganistan, a member of his crew was shot in the chest by a sniper. The metal plate he wore on his vest over his heart stopped the bullet, but the force knocked him over. Immediately he was on his feet, rifle pointed sternly outward, looking through his sights for his enemy. Backing towards his Humvee, he kept sweeping the horizon until he was inside the Humvee and in relative safety.
Later he said he had absolutely no recollection of the event.
He simply was playing like he practiced.
Pamela J. Stubbart
on 15 Apr 13This is a very interesting anecdote, thank you so much for sharing.
The philosopher in me, though, can’t let this quote go misattributed. It’s not from Aristotle himself, but Will Durant, a historian whose excellent prose is often mistaken for having come from the horse’s mouth :)
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Aristotle#Misattributed
@amelapay
Mayukh Bhaowal
on 15 Apr 13The old saying “Practice makes a man perfect” is obsolete. The new saying is “Perfect practice makes a man perfect”
@mayukhb
Atte
on 15 Apr 13It’s easy to tell yourself that you’ll get it right when you absolutely have to. In reality, when the time comes, we don’t “rise to the occasion,” we do things just like in practice. Practice is where you do all the work, execution is just showing-up.
Kyle
on 15 Apr 13‘We do not rise to the level of our expectations. We fall to the level of our training.’ -Archilochus
Anonymous Coward
on 15 Apr 13w
Mark
on 15 Apr 13I heard a former Navy Seal use the Archilochus quote the other day as it related to battle. I’ve never been so inspired and enlightened.
Ben Kinnaird
on 16 Apr 13Interesting thought Jason. It now makes sense why we did the very same thing in Kung Fu with knife training.
Just last night we were moving on to less formulaic movements to use more judgement and instinct. In many cases I found myself working hard to unlearn bad habits from prior practice.
Amir
on 16 Apr 13Thanks for sharing good post. Your post really rings true with me for giving presentations.
Peter
on 16 Apr 13Reading this I’m reminded of a motto Chris Wilcox of the Boston Celtics came up with to keep his playing edge: “If you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready.”
GeeIWonder
on 16 Apr 13Would anyone like to (mis)attribute “No pain no gain” and “Pain in weakness leaving the body” while we’re at it?
I nominate Jose Canseco and Lance Armstrong, respectively.
Jill D
on 16 Apr 13“You play like you practice. Practice sloppy and you’ll play sloppy.”
That’s an awesome point. That’s one reason, despite years of repetition, most people fail to become experts at what they do. There is an amazing article on deliberate practice here: http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2012/07/what-is-deliberate-practice/
An excerpt: .Devan
on 17 Apr 13I concur. My classical guitar playing went up several notches when I started treating my practice sessions seriously and strived to perform perfectly each time I practiced in the bedroom with no one else listening. I made sure I worked on position changes that usually broke the flow of my playing.
By the same token, I found it important to focus on the whole as well as the part. If I was struggling with one particular change, I found I tended to focus on just that bit, and let the rest of the piece fall into mediocrity by comparison. Now I tend to practice the difficult parts until they are etched in my muscle memory, then go back and work on the entire piece so each section flows into the other with the same conviction.
Ant
on 17 Apr 13Does anyone have a link to video like the one mentioned in the article? Would love to use this in the pre-brief for our medical/nursing simulation sessions where my least-favourite thing to hear is “Oh, I wouldn’t do that in real life…”
Juan Ruiz
on 21 Apr 13Well said.
Mediocrity is an acquired habit.
Vishal Mehta
on 22 Apr 13Echo…echo…echo!
Really nice gem, Jason – especially your storytelling-articulation – it resonates so hard that it’s embarrassingly revealing my own sloppiness.
I thank you for a permanent takeaway.
This discussion is closed.