Step 1) Read the manual.
Step 2) Throw manual away.
Step 3) Realize you actually need the manual.
Step 4) Go online and download manual.
Step 5) Still don’t use the manual.
Step 6) Get mad when things don’t work.
There are times in life where you can get so angry at yourself because you know in your heart of hearts exactly the course you should be following, but your ego stands in the way. Like the analogy I describe above, despite knowing that there is a clear set of standards that are required before one embarks on a task, we all fail – at some point (or a lot of points) – to read our own hearts.
I first wrote this article with a bit of anger, and I think that it was against my previous style. It’s actually a bit truer to my own personality, but – comparing it to the rest of my messages – it was not true to this site. That’s the interesting thing about life: You can be true to yourself, even if it’s a slightly modified/filtered version. Sometimes the message needs to fill the void, rather than the entirety. It is rare that everything is missing from your life, but it can feel like you have nothing if you’re missing that one special thing.
Alas, the point of this article (and my steps above) is to know and understand that other people have been here before you, before us. They’ve walked this path from apprenticeship to journeyman to expert to master – and some have even become legendary. Some of them were kind enough to publish works on how they became who they were, and we can use their experiences as guidance. Certainly we can blaze our own paths, but sometimes it’s hard finding the starting line. The masters who documented their experience are allowing us to walk with them for the first few hundred miles.
Don’t throw all of this good knowledge away. Read about what you want to do, breath in the air of knowledge. Buy the books, do the work, walk the path. Live like you’re already the master, and you will naturally seek what the master does.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned before reaching the age of thirty, it is that professionals always use the right equipment/tools, they follow industry changes, and they constantly practice their work (even when they aren’t getting paid to do so). This is why you can’t start something new with the expectation of making money. If you love it enough that you can become adept, the money will naturally follow. Don’t do it for the money. Do it for what it does for your soul. Let the money be a bonus.
Live like the master. Become the master.
Man. Vicarious.
Man. Vicarious. 