I’m not quite sure to whom I should attribute this quote. One of my training partners shared it with me recently. He’s a twenty-something cage fighter 👊🏽. But don’t worry, you don’t need to step into the Octagon to put this advice to use.
You’ve probably heard of “flow state” where you execute effortlessly. We all want to play our game like this. What we often ignore is how high performers build their ability to play with flow. That’s often done through Deliberate Practice aka drilling. Deliberate Practice isn’t effortless, it’s when we push our limits and struggle to execute.
Deliberate Practice often involves isolating discrete parts of our game so that we can focus on the individual building blocks.
📝Preparing for a test – using active recall to cement topics in our memory
🗣️Rehearsing a speech – delivering individual slides without notes until we can do it naturally
🔬Getting ready to interview – asking yourself challenging questions until you can answer confidently
These techniques aren’t particularly fun or “flowly”. Pushing ourselves to practice the individual pieces of our game is what enables us to go out and play our best when it matters. Don’t sleep on drilling and you’ll be ready to go out and kill it when you play.