Skill: You have to be Good to be Lucky
I started this blog because I wanted to figure out why it seems that Prince Edward Islanders, in general, have lower standards when (subjectively) compared to other Canadians. This is by no means a blog written by a subject matter expert doing bona fide research to back his up his claim. This is one Islander’s opinion based on what he’s seen over many years of living both on the Island and in other parts of the country.
And so I’ve spent the last number of weeks trying to write about the things that I think could be responsible for the Island’s acceptance of a low bar that makes it easy for everyone to get over without failure. All I can do is write about these topics as I’ve seen them through my own eyes.
I’ve committed — wisely or not — to write one blog post per week on the topic from beginning of June until end of August. Seth Godin writes a blog every day — seven days of the week, 365 days a year for at least the last decade. If he can do that, then I should be able to pump out one blog post a week for heaven’s sake!
This is my eighth post of the summer and here are the basic stats for my first seven posts.
Failure
This certainly seems like failure to me — especially last week’s post. Things seemed to start off ok. I was happy with making it to double digit views. Still, there are folks getting triple and quadruple digit views.
Luck
Maybe I’m just not yet lucky? Maybe I just need to keep writing until the break through occurs?
Mindset
Or it could be that I have the wrong mindset. I’m looking at these stats and telling myself that I’m not lucky and that I’m failing instead of giving myself the benefit of the doubt. Or maybe my mindset is too cocky? I feel people are dumb for not reading and they’re missing out on something awesome.
Skill
I enjoy writing. I always have. However, enjoying writing isn’t the same as being good at writing. Good writing is definitely a skill and like any skill you need to get repetitions and you need to get feedback with those repetitions. There’s not really a lot of feedback in those numbers for my blog posts. I know that some posts were read more and some were read much less but I don’t know why that is. It’s hard then to determine what to change when you don’t have that detailed feedback.
I just need to write better or to be more interesting, I tell myself. Okay…great! How the heck do I do that? And I think that that’s where all these factors come together. You need the right mindset so that you can endure the failures and the uncomfortable teachings that feedback often provides. More importantly, we need to understand the interplay between skill and luck. I’ve always liked the following saying:
You have to be good to be lucky and lucky to be good.
It reminds you that exceptional skill at something is vital to helping you get over a bar that is set very high. However, there are plenty of skilful individuals in all kinds of different fields that have never been noticed even though they were just as capable as the people who did get noticed. And so it’s not enough to be good, you also have to be in the right place at the right time — you have to be lucky.
I don’t know what the solution is for my writing career (and I use that term very loosely). I just know that giving up isn’t the answer — for me. As for raising the bar, it could be that many Islanders aren’t as skilful as their counterparts in other provinces and that is what holds us back. However, I don’t believe for a second that we aren’t capable. I do think we need to understand the recipe for getting over a high bar is a combination of ingredients: the right mindset, embracing failure, getting good luck and being skilful.
I think all of that needs to be topped off with a big ole’ dollop of perseverance. Maybe Islanders lack the motivation and desire to constantly face that high bar? Maybe all that effort just isn’t worth it to them?
I have no idea how this post will do this week. Whatever the result, I’ll still write another five blogs about raising the standards here on Prince Edward Island. If I want people reading this then I need to be lucky. If I want to benefit from good luck, then I need to be skilful. If I want to be skilful, then I need to put in the effort and have the right mindset to persevere through the bad luck and failures.
Raising the bar isn’t only about getting over it. It’s about trying to get over it. And that’s a journey. Quitting when we can’t meet the standard and lowering the bar so that we can consistently clear it is a journey of a different kind.
I’m no expert at writing but I keep writing. There are lots of things I’m no expert in but I keep trying. I believe that it’s worth it and I know there must be other Islanders out there who feel the same. That good enough could always be better and in pursuing that elusive always be better, we aren’t wasting our lives trying to be something we’re not. Nor are we failing to live in the moment because we set the bar higher than the norm.
