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#ive started setting it up (itll take a lot of drawing to explain it all) but one of them is the animal shed
stimmypaw · 3 years
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stimmypaw reads the apprentice’s quest, a blog post
A big one, just a bunch of thoughts as I’m reading it, of course, lots of spoilers for the first book in the Warrior Cats series A Vision of Shadows. This will be covering just the first book tho, it’s all in the Read More, let’s gooooooo!!!!
Vision Of Shadows time
Lots of new cats!!! I don't remember these guys as kits or anything wrow!!! I like their names but itll take a while to get used to them
Also cant believe they printed stormcloud's dead name
Omg there's a cat named beepaw
I love these cats all of them so much im going 2 cry
All new names are perfect
I FORGOT HOW GORGEOUS THE CAT VIEW IN THE RECENT BOOKS WAS, LOVE IT LOVE IT LOVE IT
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I'm glad leafpool smokes weed
I love reading from Jayfeather's point of view, his grumpiness hasn't grown on me ever but thats just me, I still enjoy it lots he's great and its fun
Firestar and Leopardstar's characterizations are On Point i love it
OOF i feel so bad when jayfeather is mean to others, poor kestrelflight, I love those two
Lovely Jayfeather moments now its time for the first chapter
I like this duo! Also I didn't think I'd ever say this but shut up squirrelflight one can have fun AND learn with their mentors
Sparkkit sounds nice she makes jingling bell noises when she walks around
Alderkit is chadphobic /j
I can see Alderkit taking deep breaths to relax its rotating in my mind its beautiful
God this first chapter feels so good and comfortable, like eating noodles and chicken nuggets. I am so so deeply in love with it, its gorgeous!
Sparkkit is so perfect too, and Graystripe remembering Firestar aaaaaa
DUSTPELT SAID WHAT? PHDHAHAHHA OH NOOOO I don't remember their relationship much, must have been fun, I love young little creature squirrelflight I MISSED HER SO BAD WOW
I started reading the second chapter and died, I think ill take a break now 2 sleep heehhee
I love them describing twoleg stuff its always so fun and alien, like watching an animal planet show about funny sea creatures.
Also I have determined sparkpaw is my favorite, might be my favorite cat ever next to hollyleaf??? I really identify with her and also she's autistic i have decided that
Alderpaw baby noooo hhhh their mentor at least is trying to show its okay, he seems very emotionally distant so far and alderheart feels very emotionally needy, actually both of them do, did I mention I love Sparkpaw??? I might be imprinting myself 2 much on her
I love how like, its clear both of them are absolutely anxious and worried about others opinions on them, which is clearly something they got from being Firestar's grandkids, deputy kids and leader kids. And bramblestar too, I recall him being quite the anxious lad ahhah. Sparkpaw will be showing confidence and being loud but the second anyone isn't approving of her or she does something "wrong" she gets small and quiet, and she ended up setting a high bar for herself by being good at hunting and fighting so I'm curious to see how that will go. Also there's nothing wrong with being guided through a crowded place to meet others Sparkpaw!!! I bet the two of them would be stuck without not knowing how to talk to others had Needlepaw not shown up. I love them, my gf is mocking me saying I'm a Sparkpaw kinnie.
Apprentices will like learn about a thing and tell everyone about it all the time and assume its always true in every situation and thats valid I love kids like that. Also in my head Needlepaw kinda looks like a porcupine. Oh boo she's fatphobic >:(
I love apprentices they are so fun and silly, just making fun of the leaders like its nothing. The way they are clearly learning and absorving everything their warriors say and do like sponges its just ***chefs kiss***
Omg shadowclan is just full of 12 year olds help
And then the old person said "it sure is hard being old!" And everyone clapped
Shout-out to pretty Riverclan apprentice #481977 I love her
Leafpool: 👁👁
Alderpaw: I knew it im cursed and awful and terrible and I will never amount to anything
I wish the cats didn't seem to be giving up on him so easily though
Ah yes the classic thunderclan move "you suck, into the medicine hole you go"
The way sparkpaw changes the things she says and how she does when it isn't the status quo around her oooooooooooooyeaaaaaaa I love 1 autistic cat
Alderpaw considering your problems lesser than other cats won't help you deal with them better bro
I love Needlepaw's excitement about Alderpaw being a medicine cat apprentice, and her sarcasm, she feels like a preppy teenager
Ahhh this is so good, I am so thirsty for family moments like this, just Alderpaw bonding with grandma, I’ll definitely want to draw this one it’s so sweet.
Oh to be young and silly.
I really am enjoying like, Alderpaw’s struggles to seeing how he fits in the clan, how he fits in himself, how he wants to be seen and what he wants to be, it’s really good. I Am Engaged(tm) With This Plot.
SPARKPAW NOOOOOOO but also Yes I want her to be shown vulnerable and weak please 
POP, god watching this stuff always awful, the cats must have thought he broke her ahahah
Also, really great that they learned from Dovewing and now like leave choices and discussions about prophecies between adults
And plus Brambles seemed to take the time to explain stuff to him, seems he wont be going alone either the 1 thing is that he will be the only one knowing what the journey is really about, why though??? I didnt read Firestar's Quest or whatever why does Skyclan need to be secret??? Seems quite silly really!
YESSSS SANDSTORM GET HIS ASS FIGHT FIGHT LOVE THIS LOVE SANDSTORM
I could feel squirrelflight nearing explosion here, this was very fun, i wish they werent hiding this though!!!
The secret thing is showing to be a plot point so I am once again Very Engaged
Also, wonderful dialogue bit, someone asked Bramblestar why an Elder is going and:
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Lovely perfect perfect
I miss you dovewing
SQUIRRELFLIGHT LOVE YOU
Oh boy this is it
Traveling book moment
Graystripe: Soooo you're excited to go on the journey to the old territories and Skyclan?
Sandstorm: Yes! It's been ages and-
Graystripe: I'm sure the tribe will love the visit too
Sandstorm, groaning: Oh noooo I forgot about how the tribe is in the way of every journeyyyyy noooooo they're such a racist caricature, please tell me you have a plan
Graystripe: Yes don't worry about it the writers forgot about the tribe in my comic book so you can just use the excuses i did to actively avoid it
Sandstorm: Oh thank Starclan
Sparkpaw's desperation to prove herself oof, her anxiety with understanding the prophecy, oh boy, and Alderpaw feeling too overwhelmed by the questions and not managing to talk!!!! I am so glad they are both autistic
Hoping "Being Leader" wont mean theyre putting nonsense responsibility on the apprentice again
Ah good Sandstorm is on the lead again, as she should, she should have been leader she would have been great
I can't believe Alderpaw thinks I look stupid and diseased :( /j
Everything about this twoleg scene was scandalous I loved it, Sparkpaw just toppled over a trash bag and they are eating from it, iconic, also did those twolegs throw out a whole turkey? Damn
Its not that Sparkpaw is freakishly good at hunting she is very hungry and constantly on the watch for things to eat
BRO Ive never been in a road where the drivers are this wild, throwing bottles out of the car????? Ive seen Fruit being thrown like once or twice, what the fuck!!! I'm glad they are going to wait until the morning to continue
Okay I was not expecting Needlepaw to show up this girl is chaotic I love her
ACTUALLY YEAH WHY DIDNT THEY TELL THE OTHER CLANS ABOUT THIS SINCE THE PROPHECY IS ABOUT ALL THE CLANS???
Needlepaw is like Rono from Bambi 2 if he wasnt a mean bully and thats very epic
Very curious character though, how come her mentor isnt teaching her the warrior code properly? Is that an issue with all apprentices?? Is the clan overwhelmed by 12 year olds and they won?
Having lots of fun trying to play the game "what animal are they describing this time" the erins made here, im glad they're in a farm. Worried about Sandstorm though :c
Fuck im worried about sandstorm a lot, her wound hurt on Me
Yeah water is good youre right sandstorm
Aw man I hope she's okay let her at least survive to meet skyclan please
NOOOOOOOO SANDSTORMA A AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Sandtteooonrjrbbbmmnnnnnnnnnn
I am so sad
Alderpaw denying it, Starclan shining upon their vigil, everything crushed me i cried
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Alderpaw considers Nihilism
Haven't seen a cat thank starclan for prey in a while its
Oh look they time skipped a journey! They don't tend to do that thats nice
I'm so excited to be meeting The Skyclan that everyone in the fandom knows now
So far they seem kinda mean but thats most clans at first glance really
Okay somethings up
I uh have heard of Darktail pretty sure he's a bad guy so yeah something really bad happened to Skyclan
Am worried
Darktail sounds like an evil himbo* i may be enjoying him actually
*himbos are usually nice by default so he's just evil and stupid and strong
Does needletail know these cats already?????
Ah
Shit
Oh okay fuck
I've been quietly reading the rest because I am just concerned and I want them to be okay as quickly as possible
Waterfalls are a classic nice
Oh boy time for our unlikely duo of Alderpaw and Needlepaw to get out of a Mess!
I did not expect this to end up with the two of them journeying into parenthood, but I'm happy it did
Well actually I'm very unhappy theyre so lost and there's no sign of Skyclan I am very worried for everyone involved Sparkpaw must be feeling awful!
Twigkit is a great name
Yeah this ended terribly
Overall! Frigging loved it this book was GOOD and a great start for the series I am very excited to read the rest, SO WORRIED ABOUT SKYCLAN THO AAAA the characterizations were great the characters were great the pacing was fun and I didn't get bored once!
I think o only wish I had read this sooner really so I could look up others thoughts without getting heavily spoiled about the last books, I can watch a few videos already though thats a start ahhaha. But yeah it was great and it felt very good to read, haven't swallowed up a book so quickly in a very long time!!! Very happy I finally got my hands on this 💕💖💕💖💕💖 cant wait 2 start the next one
If you read all this, hope you had fun hahaha, ill be making more of these cus theyre fun and I like talking about warrior cats thats just my thing
Til next time
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kazzadilla · 7 years
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got any tips on drawing bodies for a struggling artist? ;u;
awh sure !! ill do my best 8)
i think one of the BIGGEST things that will help improve your art is to really just study the body. and not just when you’re drawing, either; your eyes will soak up information in your day to day life, too. really watch people as they go about their work: how do they move? whats their body type like? are they top-heavy or bottom-heavy? 
another thing is to just draw a lot. get rid of the idea that everything you produce has to be good. really limit yourself; i tend to find that without a goal in mind, i can get really lost/overwhelmed while im drawing. even if that goal is just to set a time limit and draw for that entire session--it can really help hone your skills.
use references!! figure and gesture drawing has helped me SO MUCH in the last few months since ive started taking life drawing classes in college. ive found that i really enjoy 2-minute poses, because theyre really loose and its okay if they look bad. i only spent 2 minutes on them! this is practice that you definitely need because itll help you make the 15 minute drawings not look bad.
theres a million things i can say about anatomy, but honestly theres so many other tutorials out there that can say it better than i can; obviously, you should learn it, but something ive found is that anatomy doesnt always have to be perfect for the drawing to be good. i’ve done a few sketches to explain:
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i did these in about 10 minutes each, without references. there are a couple things that i, as the artist, can see that would need fixing if i were to complete these. but a lot of other people might not notice, because these poses look natural! they flow, even if the form isnt quite right. a drawing with screwy anatomy but has a lot of flow is a lot easier to look at than a drawing with perfect anatomy but is also super stiff. its all about the feel of the body, if that makes sense.
and again, i only drew these in about 10 minutes! they arent perfect, and i can still scrap them without feeling like ive wasted a lot of my time on something that looks ‘bad’. i never let myself spend too much time on a sketch, because i’ll end up overworking it and often times that is the first step to ruining a good piece.
know your weak points and work to get over them; for instance, i tend to make my legs too short in proportion to the rest of the body. once i realized it, i started taking extra measures to lengthen them. if something looks wrong, flip you canvas. do that often, even if something doesnt look wrong! 
also a little unrelated, but something i realized recently with feet; they are hardly ever even with each other! putting them on different levels is gonna make your piece look a lot more 3D and dynamic. you can see that really plainly in this piece i did recently:
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the foot on the left is a lot higher up than the foot on the right! it gives the pose a lot of ‘action’ and it feels more real than if i had lowered the legs to be on the same level.
thats... really all i got at the moment. i hope that helps?? let me know if you need more clarity bc i kinda just word-barfed everywhere haha
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themoneybuff-blog · 5 years
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The Value of Competence and Mastery
One of the most interesting personal finance concepts Ive come across is the Renaissance ideal, which I first learned of from the writings of Jacob Lund Fisker. Fiskers idea is simple: For every skill out there that people find useful, there is a level of ability of that skill where, if youre below that level, youll pay someone else to do it for you, whereas if youre above that level, someone will pay you to do it. (if youre near that fine line, its usually worthwhile to just do it yourself.) Fisker argues that youre better off having a large set of skills that are above the level at which people will pay you to do it rather than performing at a very high level at just a few skills and having to pay others for all other skills. What does that mean in the real world? Lets say you have a researcher who is one of the brightest people in the entire world at a particular research area and a few associated skills, but aside from that, this researcher struggles with everyday life. That person can barely accomplish very basic household tasks and never with any efficiency and usually just throws money at basic needs (or relies on the generosity of others). On the other hand, you have a person who is a competent carpenter, a competent plumber, a competent chef, competent at IT, competent at household tasks, reasonably well versed on a lot of different intellectual topics, and so on. Fisker argues that the latter person, a person with a lot of areas of competence, is far more stable in terms of their financial future, because not only will that person have significantly fewer expenses, that person can easily find employment in a variety of fields and can often combine their competencies to find a lot of high paying jobs. A person with just a few highly trained skills might be world-class in those skills, but what if those skills become less valuable going forward? That person is in real trouble. This idea is largely in line with my own life experience and observation about how people (myself included) find employment. Over the years, however, Ive somewhat expanded and altered some of these ideas. Theres a lot to unpack here, so lets dig in. Competence and Skill When I look at this idea, I tend to see two different lines that separate skills into three groups. The lowest level of skill is what I might call incompetence, which is where youre unable to do the task at all and usually hire someone to do it for you. The next level of skill is competence, which is where youre able to do the task well for yourself and dont need to hire someone to do it for you. The highest level is what we might call mastery, which is where youre able to perform a skill well enough for someone to pay you to do it. This doesnt refer to jobs that are mostly manual labor that anyone could do, but jobs that require a specific skill. Lets look at cooking, for example. Someone who is incompetent at cooking subsists on prepackaged meals or meals prepared by someone else. Typically, this person either has someone in their household that cooks for them or theyre spending a lot of money on food preparation (whether its prepackaged meals from a factory or restaurant meals). Someone who is competent at cooking can make their own meals and snacks out of inexpensive ingredients. This significantly reduces their food bill. However, theyre generally not skilled enough where anyone would pay them to do this. Someone who is skilled at cooking can get a job at a restaurant because they can make good meals quickly and efficiently. You can do the same thing for almost any skill or area of knowledge. Theres a level of incompetence, where you dont understand the topic or the skill; a level of competence, where you reasonably understand the topic and can reasonably practice the skill; and a level of mastery, where you deeply understand the topic and can practice the skill at a very high level. Typically, people who are incompetent at particular skill have to pay others to do it for them, competent people can do those things for themselves, and masters are paid to do their thing. If we roll back to the analogy from earlier, the researcher is a very high-level master in a few specific areas, but is mostly incompetent in all other areas. As long as the researchers career cares about mastery of those specific areas, the researcher is fine, but the researcher is going to be carrying a lot of expense. The jack of all trades, on the other hand, has relatively low-level mastery of quite a few areas and competence in a ton of areas. This individual rarely has to hire anyone to do anything and is employable in a lot of situations. Rather than being paid for pure mastery of one area, this person usually makes money by combining a bunch of different lower level masteries and competencies into one package. Entrepreneurs often fall into this category, for example. Your Areas of Competence So, lets translate this to your own life. What things are you competent at? In other words, what things can you and do you easily handle for yourself that other people pay others to do? I dont mean that you do them well enough or efficiently enough to be employed to do it, but that you do it well enough to meet your own needs. Are you good at making your own meals? Keeping your house clean? Doing your own laundry? What about fixing minor plumbing issues? Handling basic car maintenance? Handing minor electrical issues in your home? Can you repair some non-electronic appliances? Can you fix electronics issues in your home? In other words, do you regularly need to buy prepackaged food or order food because youre not up to the task of making food? Do you have a housecleaning service because youre awful at housekeeping? Do you have a laundry service that you use? Do you call a plumber every time theres any kind of plumbing issue? Do you take your car to the shop for every minor issue and every maintenance task? Do you call an electrician every time something isnt quite right? Do you have an IT guy that you call (often a family member) whenever a device doesnt work the way you want it to work? Its okay if you do these things occasionally or when things demand someone with mastery, but competence means that you handle issues like this for yourself almost all of the time. Make a mental list of your areas of competence. What things do you do well enough for yourself that other people often pay people to do for them? You arent good enough (perhaps) to do it professionally, but youre certainly good enough to fulfill your own needs almost all of the time. Your Areas of Mastery Mastery generally refers to areas of expertise where you have a high enough level of skill and/or knowledge that other people rely on you for help and will often pay you for your knowledge, skill, and expertise. Most people that have a steady job that pays reasonably well have at least one area of mastery that they rely on, or else they rely on a lot of simultaneous ares of competence. Most people that run a small business, particularly a service-oriented one, have some sort of mastery that theyre drawing on, usually revolving around an ability to do something very efficiently and with good quality. What are you good enough at that people will pay you for the service? What knowledge do you have that others will pay you for the opportunity to tap it? Those are your areas of mastery. Obviously, there are varying degrees of mastery, and higher levels of mastery earn a higher wage. True masters can often name their own price and can often get away with few other areas of competence in their life. Becoming Competent The secret to becoming competent at something is to just do it as often as possible. If you want to become competent at cooking, just get yourself in the kitchen as frequently as you can. If you want to become competent at computer programming, just write code as frequently as you can. If you want to become competent at plumbing, dive into every home plumbing issue that you can, either in your own residence or running over to help out friends. If you want to become competent in a particular area of knowledge, start reading books and taking notes on that subject. At first, youre going to be bad at whatever task it is youre taking on, and thats perfectly fine. If you have a bit of natural talent, you might quickly become competent at it; if not, itll take some time, but almost anyone can become competent at almost anything by doing it for a while. If you dont know how to do something, YouTube is an incredible resource for teaching you enough of the basics to become competent at almost anything you might want to do. If you want to learn about something, Wikipedia can give you just enough to figure out what books you should read on the subject. Competence, in my mind, means that you feel skilled enough at a particular task to simply prefer to do it for yourself most of the time rather than have someone else do it for you. Competence in an area of knowledge means you understand it well enough to explain it to others, and if its a concept thats debatable, you understand both the benefits and flaws of the concept well enough to explain it to others. You can carry on a conversation about that area of knowledge with both a person that knows almost nothing as well as a person with mastery in the topic. Heres an example of this idea at work, in the form of four people preparing a pasta meal. The first person is competent they can prepare a good meal for themselves. The next person is still what I would call competent, but a high level of competent they wouldnt quite be paid for it, but they can prepare a really good dinner at home. The last two people are at various levels of mastery. (An incompetent person in this video would call a local Italian restaurant and get takeout, or else flail around without any direction in the kitchen.) Turning Competence into Mastery The path from beginner to competence is easy enough just do it but how does one go from competence in an area to a level of mastery at which people will pay you to do that particular thing? Thats a lot harder. For starters, in some skill levels, your level of skill has to be incredibly high to be paid just for that skill. I could practice for the next 10 years and still not be good enough at basketball to get paid just to play basketball. Its not happening in any reality. I can definitely be competent at basketball understanding the game and playing in local pickup games but to be able to be paid for that? Its not happening. (Remember, were defining mastery here as a high enough skill level that people will pay you to perform that skill.) Some skills simply dont earn a lot of money, either. Other skills require some kind of external certification of your skill to earn a lot of money. In other words, there is no specific path or guaranteed path from competence to mastery. However, there are some things that almost all journeys have in common. For starters, they typically involve some form of deliberate practice. Deliberate practice is a type of practice that is focused on improving technique rather than mindless repetition. For example, if I just shot 100 free throws, that would be just mindless repetitive practice. However, if I shot 50 free throws with careful attention to detail, videotaped it, watched the video, looked for flaws, then spent the next 50 shots carefully shooting with attention to correcting those flaws, that would be deliberate practice. If you want to know more about the specifics of deliberate practice, heres a great introduction to deliberate practice by James Clear. Deliberate practice can be done for almost any skill. You do something carefully and deliberately, thinking about each step, study what youre doing to look for flaws, then do it carefully and deliberately with the intent of correcting those flaws. This is where a coach or a teacher can really help, but you can do this yourself. For mastery over areas of knowledge, I usually point to two things: meeting the requirements for employment in that area as well as being able to explain that area of knowledge to an elementary aged child. If I cant explain something to a child, I dont understand it forward and backward; however, if I can do that, I can almost always achieve certifications and such. One great way to practice this is to actually try to explain what youre learning to a child, or at least on a childs level. If you cant, note where youre having difficulty and you have a direct arrow to your next area of focus in your learning. As I noted earlier, the exact path to being able to be paid for a specific skill or area of knowledge varies quite a bit. A Palette of Competencies (and a Mastery or Two) These ideas are interesting, but how does this translate into practical advice for making more money? Lets dig right into that, shall we? Almost every employee and entrepreneur out there making more than minimum wage has achieved mastery in an area or a few related areas or has competence in a wide variety of areas. Often, the people who really succeed have both they are masters of business organization and communication and competent at engineering and computer programming, for example. So, ideally, if you want to earn more money, you should be aiming for a wide variety of competencies and a few masteries. Why is that so useful? Its often the combination of several competencies or the combination of a few masteries and a few competencies that add up to a lot of value. Its relatively easy to find a person thats a master level at one specific thing; its also relatively easy to find a person thats competent at a few things. Whats difficult is to find people with specific mixes of competencies and masteries that makes them specifically equipped to tackle valuable problems. Thats what people will pay a lot of money for. Thats how people found successful businesses. Theres a specific problem out there and they have a good mix of masteries and competencies to solve that problem. The thing is, the more competencies and masteries you accumulate, the greater the set of problems in life youre going to be able to solve. If youre a master of just one particular skill and are competent in two or three areas, there are likely a few jobs out there that are great for you, but not many. If you are a master of several things and competent at lots of things, there are likely lots of problems out there youre suited to solve, and thus lots of job opportunities and lots of potential entrepreneurial paths to follow. Thats because those different masteries and competencies combine in different ways for different problems. Its like having a box of Legos. The more Legos you have in the box, the more things you can build. A mastery is like a really vital piece for a few particular things you might build; a competency is a fairly ordinary piece, but several of those are always needed to build anything worthwhile. The more you fill up your box of Legos with competencies and masteries, the more things you can build and the more problems you can solve and the more employment opportunities you have. So, what can you practically do? The first thing you should do is figure out what competencies and masteries you do have. What does your resume look like? What skills do you list on there? What things outside of your resume are you competent at? Think of things you do in your day to day life. There may even be things outside of your employment that you could be doing to earn an income, but youve chosen a different path. For most people, that ends up being a pool of talents that they possess. They might be really specific, or they might be fairly broad its all fine. Now, consider what specific competencies or a specific mastery you could add to that pool that would make you employable in more areas or make it easier for you to start your own business or side gig. What abilities, if added to this pool, could really increase your professional opportunities? Youll probably start by looking at advancements in your current career path, but dont stop there. Consider what other career paths youre not too far from being ready for if you could just add another skill or two to your pool. For example, I moved from data mining as a career path to writing, which might seem like a huge leap, but the truth was that as a data miner, I actually did a lot of writing on a daily basis, and I had the technical skill to code a very complex data driven website on my own. I really only needed knowledge and experience in another field and some general entrepreneurial ability to set myself up to make that leap. This isnt a quick process. Its something to mull over for a period of time as you try to identify a few new things you can become competent with or master in order to really amp up your career possibilities, because thats what this is all about: Adding competencies and masteries to your set of skills not only sets you up for advancement, but it multiplies the possibilities in and out of your field. It becomes much easier to rebound when things fall apart. It becomes much easier to move into interesting opportunities that pay well. It becomes much easier to open doors that would have been closed to you. Once youve figured out a few things you can add, then its time to start building those competencies and masteries, as described earlier. Start doing. Start learning. If youre wondering, the big thing Im trying to add to my skill set right now is building towards a level of mastery (or at least strong competence) in fiction writing and adding competency in a bunch of different ideas as well as competency in self-publishing Ill let you figure out what that all means. I Dont Have Time to Do This! The reaction that most people have to these ideas is one of time. I dont have time to learn new skills! I barely have time for life as it is! Heres the thing: You can work on skills as part of your life as it is right now. Your job provides a great opportunity to learn new skills, hone them into masteries, and even sharpen the masteries you already have. Just strive to do what you do now with a higher level of excellence, or look for opportunities to learn new skills or take on new challenges. Daily life offers tons of opportunities to pick up new competencies. Start making meals every day instead of just ordering food or going to restaurants or eating convenience meals. Instead of waiting for your oil to get changed, spend that hour at home learning how to change your own oil and change your own wiper blades. Instead of calling a plumber when your toilet doesnt work, fire up a YouTube video and diagnose your toilet problem. Look for anything in your life that you pay other people to do and do it for yourself, even if it seems really hard at first. Not only are you adding new competency to your life, youre also gaining the courage to try new things. During your downtime, read challenging books on topics that you want to learn about to add to your repertoire. Spend less time on cable television and Netflix and social media and more time on really challenging books and other learning materials. Look at the things you do in your life and ask yourself how you could do them a little better or a little more efficiently. Walk through the little repeated tasks step by step and find ways to shave off a minute here or make the result a little better there. (This is an awful lot like deliberate practice.) You have the time. Its really more about using your time better. The Matter of Convenience The final issue I want to cover is the fact that many people choose to pay others to do things for them out of convenience and time saving. A particular evening might not afford the time to cook a meal, so you order takeout as youre leaving work, grab it in three minutes, and when you arrive home you pop it right on the table. You might be overwhelmed by laundry, so you just pay a service to take care of it. Theres nothing wrong with doing this, provided that the time youre saving is being used in a way thats more useful and valuable than what youre doing. If youre buying takeout so that you can sit on the couch and binge Netflix for three hours, thats not an effective use of time. If your counterargument is that youre worn out after a day of work, then you should be getting more sleep try making a meal for half an hour, watching Netflix for only an hour, getting half an hour of exercise, and getting an extra hour of sleep. Convenience tactics should only be freeing you up to do more effective things with your time (and, yes, meaningful leisure can be that more effective thing, but it needs to be meaningful and valuable, not just idle). If theyre freeing you up to be idle or to do unimportant things, then that means you need to change some other areas of your life. Final Thoughts Heres what you should take home from all of this. Being competent with a skill has a nice financial benefit if it means youre no longer paying someone to do it for you. The more skills youre competent in and the more areas of knowledge youre competent in, the less you have to pay others for services. Furthermore, the more things youre competent with, the more you have to draw on to be effective in your career and life. Honing a skill until it becomes a mastery is another great move. If you have a skill (or a small group of highly interrelated skills) thats useful enough on its own to get people to pay you for it, thats wonderful. If you surround it with other skills you have some level of mastery or competence in, youll find yourself endlessly employable and likely able to chart your own path in the world. Whats at the core of all of this? Constant self-learning and improvement. Constant building of new skills and refining old ones. Constant growth of your set of competencies and masteries. This isnt just a one day thing. This is a lifelong pattern of growth. Its all up to you. Good luck. Read more by Trent Hamm: https://www.thesimpledollar.com/the-value-of-competence-and-mastery/
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