Here’s how you tap into your Hidden Potential

Dear Friend,

Meet Evelyn Glennie

Evelyn is a professional percussionist who grew up in rural Scotland

Despite experiencing rejection when she first applied to London’s Royal Academy of Music, she went on to become the first full-time solo percussionist, globally.

She holds three Grammy Awards and has been knighted by Queen Elizabeth II.

Here’s something else you need to know about Evelyn.

Evelyn Glennie’s hearing has been impaired since childhood. She is profoundly deaf.

What then allowed her to reach such heights of greatness?

Two words.

Deliberate play.

As Adam Grant shares her story in his book Hidden Potential, he writes how Evelyn found ways of having fun while practicing her musical talents so it became a source of pure joy. She made it feel like play.

For instance, she would pay close attention to how each musical note reverberated throughout her whole body as she played. And to fully feel the music even more, she started playing bare feet.

While so many of us are conditioned to believe that attaining mastery requires serious effort, what Adam Grant’s research tells us is that incorporating more play into learning is what allows you to stick to something long enough to attain mastery.

Or, as Mary Poppins sings gleefully in a Spoonful of Sugar:

“In every job that must be done,

There is an element of fun.

You find the fun, and snap!

The job’s a game.”

So, how about you?

What are you trying to attain mastery in?

What would it look like with “an element of fun”?