The Path of Mastery
"How do you best move toward Mastery? To put it simply, you practice diligently, but you practice primarily for the sake of the practice itself. Rather than being frustrated while on the plateau, you learn to appreciate and enjoy it just as much as you do the upward surges. "
- taken from Mastery: The Keys to Long-Term Success and Fulfillment by George Leonard
Ken Rosewall is one of the greatest tennis players in the history of the game. He grew up in Australian on a farm, but his father loved tennis so they built courts out of ant hill dirt, and he trained tirelessly. At the age of 18 he won the Australian Championships and the French Open. Additionally, Rosewall played professionally until he was in his mid-forties, capturing every Grand Slam event except Wimbledon. But that is the surface level of what Ken Rosewall achieved. The story I am about to share was told me by a good friend of Rosewall's and illustrates in my mind what made Rosewall a master of the game.
A usual day for Rosewall begins with a phone call to one of his tennis playing buddies around the 8 o'clock hour. He calls them up to see if they want to play--he doesn't have a court at this house--but he can't just say, "Hey, you want to play today." So Kenny, or "Muscles" as his friends call him has to talk about the weather or what's going on with his grandkids, etc. Anyway, Muscles then heads to the courts to play his match.
After Muscles is done with his first match of the day, he usually calls another one of his friends to see if they want to play. If he can't get somebody else to come and meet him, he ask people who are leaving or arriving the courts if they want to play. That's all that Ken Rosewall wants to do litterally. He eats, breaths and shits tennis. And that pure enjoyment of hitting a ball over a four foot net, is what has made this man such an enormous success.
One could argue that Kenny was blessed with talent and a supportive environment as a young man. Fine, let's say that Rosewall didn't have the physical talent to make it at the elite level. With his passion for the game, he probably would have been a tennis coach and probably would have developed the largest age group program in Australia. We can put man different spins on the argument, but ultimately Rosewall's passion for tennis would have taken him to an elite level.
So this is my question to everyone reading this: what is your Passion? Where have you experience pure being-ness? This isn't an easy question. There are a lot of things that distract one from figuring out what they enjoy doing for the sake of just doing it. And then once you figure that out, you have to then figure out a way to make money doing it.
As I was writing that last sentence I had this thought: "Gosh, creating a life of pure being-ness sounds like its a real pain in the ass." This is definitely true. At the same time, the initial legwork and soul searching is the only way to live a life of pure consciousness. This crossroads was brilliatly stated in the following scene from The Matrix:
Morpheus: "This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes."
So what is your decision going to be. Will you take the blue pill or the red pill? Choose wisely.
- taken from Mastery: The Keys to Long-Term Success and Fulfillment by George Leonard
Ken Rosewall is one of the greatest tennis players in the history of the game. He grew up in Australian on a farm, but his father loved tennis so they built courts out of ant hill dirt, and he trained tirelessly. At the age of 18 he won the Australian Championships and the French Open. Additionally, Rosewall played professionally until he was in his mid-forties, capturing every Grand Slam event except Wimbledon. But that is the surface level of what Ken Rosewall achieved. The story I am about to share was told me by a good friend of Rosewall's and illustrates in my mind what made Rosewall a master of the game.
A usual day for Rosewall begins with a phone call to one of his tennis playing buddies around the 8 o'clock hour. He calls them up to see if they want to play--he doesn't have a court at this house--but he can't just say, "Hey, you want to play today." So Kenny, or "Muscles" as his friends call him has to talk about the weather or what's going on with his grandkids, etc. Anyway, Muscles then heads to the courts to play his match.
After Muscles is done with his first match of the day, he usually calls another one of his friends to see if they want to play. If he can't get somebody else to come and meet him, he ask people who are leaving or arriving the courts if they want to play. That's all that Ken Rosewall wants to do litterally. He eats, breaths and shits tennis. And that pure enjoyment of hitting a ball over a four foot net, is what has made this man such an enormous success.
One could argue that Kenny was blessed with talent and a supportive environment as a young man. Fine, let's say that Rosewall didn't have the physical talent to make it at the elite level. With his passion for the game, he probably would have been a tennis coach and probably would have developed the largest age group program in Australia. We can put man different spins on the argument, but ultimately Rosewall's passion for tennis would have taken him to an elite level.
So this is my question to everyone reading this: what is your Passion? Where have you experience pure being-ness? This isn't an easy question. There are a lot of things that distract one from figuring out what they enjoy doing for the sake of just doing it. And then once you figure that out, you have to then figure out a way to make money doing it.
As I was writing that last sentence I had this thought: "Gosh, creating a life of pure being-ness sounds like its a real pain in the ass." This is definitely true. At the same time, the initial legwork and soul searching is the only way to live a life of pure consciousness. This crossroads was brilliatly stated in the following scene from The Matrix:
Morpheus: "This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes."
So what is your decision going to be. Will you take the blue pill or the red pill? Choose wisely.
posted by Zen_Accountant at 8:41 PM
1 Comments:
Have we been watching the Matrix trilogy lately? You are assuming that a life of passion and achievement to an elite status is something desirable. Or perhaps your assumption is that everyone has a passion for something, but they might not have discovered it yet. For those people who have found their passion and pursue it with the single minded focus and determination of a pizza-joint waitress addicted to pain killers, good for them. They will achieve great things all the while missing out on many of the smaller, perhaps ordinary, great things that happen when you choose instead to hang out with an awesome friend at a hole-in-the-wall breakfast place in San Francisco. Secondly, unfortunately I don't believe everyone has the capacity for the kind of passion you're talking about. I think what separates the extraordinary individual from the ordinary ones is that they have extraordinary passion. Because if everyone had the capacity for that kind of passion, I believe it would eventually erupt from their soul and lead them. I believe the kind of passion you're talking about is like a stem cell, it can grow into anything, it just needs a path. I didn't start out with any great passion for the discus per se, I started out with a desire to work hard, push myself, and compete. As it turned out I had the right kind of inspiration from a discus coach and that's the path I took. Had I had Ken's level of passion, I wouldn't have given it up; I would still be doing it.
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