Recently I encouraged you to pick up a craft of some sort. In general terms a craft is something that has both an art and a science to it that therefore makes it a craft. Craft are uniquely human endeavors, “jobs” (though that word has come to mean something different). They are ways to shape the world around you or to shape yourself to accomplish and create things of beauty and inherent value.
For example woodworking is a craft. There is the basic premise of the cuts and designs that one makes and then there is the unique aspect that makes one’s work one’s own. There is both an art and a science to it. Perhaps ironically the arts are a great example of this to. Where there is both an art and a science to it. Whether it’s painting, sculpting, drawing, or writing a play they all have aspects of both art and science to them.
They allow for learning and becoming part of a long line of tradition while also stamping one’s unique flavor to it. This is a craft and I recommend that everyone pick one up, even if it’s not your main job. Sure you could make a little extra side money from it or if you’re “lucky” are work hard maybe even a full time income. But more important than both they help to hold onto your humanity in a world that wants to numb and destroy it.
But let’s talk about the keys to excelling at any craft. I’ll be using fiction writing and combat sports as examples here because they are two crafts that I participate in and therefore will make handy examples. Alright let’s get started.
Key To Excelling At Your Craft #1 – Learning
When most people think of learning a craft what they’re actually thinking of is one of the three components of excelling at and learning about a craft. We’ll call it the learning part because that’s what it’s associated with anyways, even though the actual learning process is longer. The learning part of a craft is the instruction on how to do the thing. It’s the master or instructor showing how something is done.
So for example in boxing this could be a coach showing you the mechanics of the cross, in BJJ the instructor demonstrating a move that you then will do with a partner, in writing it’s the workshop instructor telling you this is what a good sentence looks like or a book on editing telling you these are things you want to trim out and so on and so forth.
It’s the head knowledge of how the things work in your particular craft. It’s the basics, the science, the “learning” and it’s an essential part of learning any craft. I included this one first because it’s the one that most do and most understand on some level. The problem being that many think that this is ALL there is to learning and perfecting a craft when this is simply not true.
Key To Excelling At Your Craft #2 – Doing
Why it is that the average guy who’s been boxing for 6 months would beat the shit out of the average guy who’s a karate black belt and been doing it for 6 years? Well on average it’ll be because the boxer is doing actual fighting from about 1-3 months in and the karate guy only play fights or does the “learning” portion of the fighting craft and not the doing. Because boxers generally do full contact sparring while karatekas often don’t.
The doing is an essential part of learning any craft. For writing this is putting your butt in a seat and typing out words on a page. For fighting this isn’t practicing a move on a punching bag, with an unresistant partner, or shadow boxing/doing a kata. This is engaging in combat with a partner who is trying to hurt you as much as you are trying to hurt them. This is the actual doing. This is the practice whereas the “learning” portion is the theory (and both are important).
This is where the rubber meets the road and where you lose most people who want to be something or want a certain skill but don’t actually put in the work to do it. Reading every book on fiction writing won’t make you a better writer neither will going to every boxing/MMA/whatever class without actually applying it in full contact live sparring make you a better fighter. Now if all you do is do you’ll have a long and slow learning curve but you will be getting better and be better off than those that only “learn”. But if you want to excel then you’ll need to do both.
Key To Excelling At Your Craft #3 – Modeling
Now this is something that often gets neglected but is really the “magic ingredient” when one is already doing both the “learning” and “doing” portions of their craft. This part makes the biggest impact on the subconscious and is really good at filling in all the nooks, crannies, and gaps that are left from the doing and learning portions alone. And this portion is modelling and the most neglected of the three.
Modeling is seeing the craft done at a high level and studying it. So for example in boxing this would be watching film of high level boxers at their craft. It’d be watching Sugar Ray Robinson, Muhammed Ali, Mike Tyson, Floyd Mayweather and so on and so forth. Not watching breakdowns which would be more in the “learning” section but rather just watching the art take place unobstructed by anything.
For writing this would be reading good fiction books and letting them soak your subconscious mind. This is absorbing the craft at a high level. You won’t notice any difference from doing modelling right away. It’s something that comes in time and has a cumulative effect. But the effect is undeniable and when combined with learning and doing really skyrockets the level at which you’ll excel at your craft.
Putting It All Together
Obviously there are other factors to excelling at your craft as well such as natural talent. But combing these three factors together will ensure that you excel and progress at an optimal rate FOR YOU. Which may be very different than someone else’s optimal rate. Truth of the matter is some people will put in half the effort we do and get double the results that’s just life. But to do the best we can do (and that’s all a man can hope for) combining these three factors will make it so.
Combine learning, doing, and modelling and your progress will exponentially increase in the craft of your choice. Don’t neglect a single one because they all feed in to one another and become more powerful the more that you do. The sum is far greater than the parts in this case.
If anything I said here interests you I’d highly recommend you check out The Ultimate Alpha Collection which is a compilation of 16 of my books for the price of 5. It covers everything from being a man to making money to getting the right mindset to getting girls to fighting and more and is a resource no man should be without. Pick up your copy today!
-Charles Sledge
