SUCCESS STORY
Jackie Chan: Mastering Success with 10,000 Hours
By Meng Herr | Missional Ministries Major
While shooting Enter the Dragon, you can hear the sounds of fighting and Bruce Lee as he fights off the enemy. Stuntman, Jackie Chan, eagerly waits behind the camera for his part to go in. Bruce wielding a stick acting like he is hitting the other stuntmen hard. Jackie runs in and to get hit by the fast swing Lee did attacking on his head. “CUT!” yells the Director after the scene was finished. “Are you okay?!” Bruce said with concern and running to him. Jackie wasn’t hurt badly but as soon as Bruce held him, “the pain went away” Jackie said. He continued faking that he was hurt throughout the day, making Bruce recognize him and getting to know him more. This is one of many things that Jackie does in making his career a success as it is. Jackie had techniques that he uses in his own way that people never have really seen. When Jackie makes his movies, he uses comedy with Kung Fu making it fun and exciting for his audience. Jackie Chan’s pathways to his successful career was by completing his 10,000 hours, taking advantages of special opportunity and taking risks that he never saw coming in his career.
The theory of 10,000 hours comes from the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. In Outliers, Gladwell writes “To become a chess grandmaster also seems to take about ten years. And what’s ten years? Well, it’s roughly how long it takes to put ten thousand hours of hard practice. Ten thousand hours is the magic number of greatness” (Gladwell 41). In Outliers, he takes an example of a chess grandmaster and how long it takes to master the game of chess saying that it would take ten years. Calculating ten years with you playing eight hours a weekday and having the week end off, the total hours would be 20,800 hours! According to Galdwell, you only need about ten thousand hours to become a master or professional at what you are good at. It determines how much effort you have and the motivation to keep you going.
Comparing to Jackie, it seemed to him that he got his ten thousand hours early in his age. In the article Jackie Chan in Scholastic Action, Michael Hastings writes “At 6 years old, Jackie started at the China Drama Academy. Jackie worked 19-hour days. He practiced somersaults, flips, stunts, and Kung Fu. ‘I would get up at 5:00am, and train until midnight’ Jackie says. He got parts in school performances” (Hasting). From this, it shows us that Jackie worked hard to become the best in Kung Fu and acting. His motivation did not just come from him alone but also his parents that supported him. This also showed how dedicated he was at what he was doing and becoming what he was good at. By doing all this, he wasn’t realizing he was completing his ten thousand hours. Jackie going to China Drama Academy, which was a school just for acting, early in age is an opportunity that not much kids had. He had to audition for a position which Jackie was good enough to be accepted.
Another idea from Outliers, Gladwell also talked about special opportunities depending when and where you are. Daisy, Gladwell’s grandmother he used, who was a school teacher in a small village in the central Jamaican parish of Saint Catherine’s. She bore twin daughters, which one of them was his mother. The twins at the age of 11 and they won scholarships into an old Anglican private school. At the time, Jamaica’s education system did not have public high schools where teenagers go when they are done at age 14. Only some who took extra classes or were lucky and got recommended by their teachers, getting sent off to private schools or schools in the United States.
MacMillan, a historian and professor of University of Witwatersrand, was worried about the education system in Jamaica and how it was bad for those students who couldn’t afford the private schools. Later, MacMillan than wrote a book about the education within the Jamaican community. The people heard about it and started riots in the areas in and around Jamaica. The British finally heard the people’s voice and decide to make scholarships for the students that were not able to make it to high school. Both the twins applied for the scholarship for it and that was how they got their highs school education. They both also took exams for scholarships that could give them a chance to go to universities and getting their degrees. The results came back only one of them got it and it was Gladwell’s mom that did not. That opened a big door for the one who got it but to the other sister who did not, had to find other ways. Daisy felt pity on her daughters and did not want to send one off and not the other. His mom, which failed, took the scholarship exam again and then getting it for the next semester.
London and universities is a big deal for the twins. They meant new rooms, dorms, independent and especially money to pay it off. Their family wasn’t wealthy and at the time, there wasn’t any bank to take loans off or take government loans that was willing to help you. Daisy had to do something about it and wanted them to go to school. There was a large amount of Chinese population that was in Jamaica, which they have basically taken over the commercial shops within the areas. Gladwell wrote “Daisy went to the ‘Chinee-shop,’ to Mr. Chance, and borrowed the money. No one knows how much she borrowed, although it must have been an enormous sum. And no one knows why Mr. Chance lent it to Daisy” (276). This shows what confidence means for her and what it means to do what it can for her kids. She was willing it sacrifice what it takes to be a mom and for her kids become successful. Gladwell’s mom’s story relates a lot with Jackie Chan and what he has been through.
Jackie didn’t grow up in a wealthy family and he was almost given away to be adopted at birth because his parents couldn’t get him out of the hospital. There wasn’t much hope to begin with but as things went on, his parents moved to Australia for work opportunity. As his parents went off, Jackie got to stay in China to go to school for Drama. His parents were able to put responsibility to Jackie when he was only six years old. It wasn’t just responsibility but hope that Jackie would become the person he wants to become and have a successful life.
Jackie was able to be in movies at a young age not playing big roles but was able to have some experience at it. Some of his movies were Big and Little Wong tin Bar and The Love Eterne. Besides the small roles that he was able to do, he had the opportunity to become a stuntman at Chu Mu’s Great Earth Film Company after the years of training and going to school.
During his work at the company, he was able to be a stuntman for two of Bruce Lee’s movies Fist of Fury and Enter the Dragon. This was one of the special opportunities that Jackie had the chance to have to experience what it meant to work and feel to be famous. A Ted Talk by Kare Anderson talked about how to be an opportunity Maker and says “This word is calling out for us to have a collective mindset” (Anderson). This tells us that we should have more than what and where we are usually comfortable with. Jackie takes advantage of this idea, doing what he was best at, action comedy. Shu Yaun the author of the article Bruce Lee to Jackie Chan writes “With Bruce Lee’s untimely death in 1973, the Kung Fu film came to a crossroads and waited for new inspirations and expressions. A group of new Kung Fu talents emerged, among them Jackie Chan” (Yuan). The unfortunate death of Bruce Lee became another special opportunity that Jackie took in the best of his abilities.
Bruce Lee, setting the stage of martial arts and action in the western culture, helped Jackie on his career for success. Jackie not only used Bruce Lee’s martial arts but also used his own humor into making his movies. “In many ways, Jackie was a better actor. He was a very good acrobat and a good martial artist. Plus, he could handle humor beautifully. His look on screen was very much a joke-a-minute existence” (Logan 66). This was said by the director of Enter the Dragon when Bruce and Jackie were working together. Already, it was said that Jackie had a great career ahead of him knowing that he was a good actor. This special opportunity didn’t just fly by Jackie but he caught on and used it, having a successful career.
At the age of 17, Jackie got out of Peking Opera School and became a stuntman. At this point, he was the youngest stuntman at the time and at 18, he became a stuntman director. This shows how much things Jackie wanted to improve to become the best of the best not just acting but use his stuntman skills in his acting. He didn’t have any other people doing his stunts as he did his own. Jackie had done over 50 movies in career and holds the Guinness World Record for “Most Stunts by a Living Actor”. Jackie attempts to do all his stunts, taking risks even if it meant getting himself hurt. His dedication and motivation meant so much to Jackie, going beyond what an actor needs to do but he does it anyways. He overcame these challenges and taking these risks and exceeding his 10,000 hours mark to have this successful career.
Drunk and deadly, Jackie fights a man in the movie Drunken Master. “’My arm hit the table, my head directly to the floor. And here?’ He traces a line across his right eyebrow. ‘Big open’” Jackie hates needle. In any means, Jackie wanted to get away from the needle as much as possible even if it meant having electricity instead of stitches. Jackie and the crew go to the hospital to get the wound stitched or electrified. His fear for needle was too great and deiced to go with the electricity. “ZUUMM” You can hear the sound of the electricity burning up the cut. “Why didn’t you do the stitches? And the electricity instead?” they said. “I see needle, I start to shake” Jackie said. Even if there were other ways harder in fixing the situation, Jackie was able to take it and face it. Kare Anderson also said “They get involved in different world than theirs” (Anderson). Jackie takes other people’s perspectives, people’s values, people’s ambitions, people’s worlds and makes it out through the things that he does. Jackie does a many things other than making movies. He loves giving money to other people and becoming an opportunity maker for others. It is just not the money that makes them happy but the hope that gives them joy, to know that they will someday be like Jackie Chan. He has done many things and taken up more than enough of his 10,000 hours mastering acting and Kung Fu. He got to be with the best and became the best by taking up the special opportunity people did not have. He took on risks that he saw coming and face them right on. Jackie is a living example of what it means to live Gladwell’s theory of 10,000 and having a successful career.
Works Cited
“THAT’S NO STUNTMAN-IT’S JACKIE CHAN AT FULL TILT.” Buffalo News Feb 24 1996. ProQuest. Web. 30 Apr. 2015.
Be A Opportunity Maker. Perf. Kare Anderson. Ted Talk. N.p., Sept. 2014. Web. 4 May 2015
Gladwell, Malcolm. Outliers: The Story of Success. New York: Little, Brown, 2008. Print.
Hastings, Michael. “Jackie Chan.” Scholastic Action Feb 25 2002: 6–7. ProQuest. Web. 30 Apr. 2015.
Logan, Bey. Hong Kong Action Cinema. New York: Barnes, 1978.
Shu, Yuan. “From Bruce Lee to Jackie Chan.” Journal of Popular Film & Television 31.2 (2003): 50–59. Academic Search Premier. Web. 4 May 2015.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Meng Herr, an missional ministries major from St.Paul, Minnesota, seeks to become a leader in a worldwide mission. Herr likes hiking outdoors on a sunny day, jaming the guitar with his buddies, and having fresh food of the flea markets.
WHAT I’VE LEARNED
A good paper just doesn’t include an introduction and a conclusion, but it includes 65% research and 35% you.
Life has full disadvantages, yet disadvantages can be taken as advantages and you can achieve beyond what you think.
Prioritize. Time is everything.
10,000. The magic number that will make achieve what you are best at. Take that effort to go beyond 10,000 hours and achieve more than what others can do and leave a mark.
Patience isn’t just in fishing, it’s also in writing. Having that time to write your paper and being patient about it will make it a better paper. Rather than overnight without no sleep.
The Writing Covenant is a place where you can share. A place where I know I can be comfortable. Sometimes there’s delicious food. But there will always be great people.
Great writers use great sentences that have never been used before.
Being a minority in a school full of a majority, living at home and not the dorms, and being a freshmen in the same year, is the most challenging thing that I’ve come across.
Sources are out there for a reason. They are out there for you to use.
Seniors are the best friends you can make while you are here. Take your time to get to know them before they leave.
Volunteering and working for youth is the best thing you can ever do. It’s their smiles that encourages to do what you do. It’s their energetic lives that keeps you energized. It’s when they feel sad and feeling good that you are there to help and support them. It’s the love that you show each other that keep you and the youth going.
Deep level of honesty within your writing makes it even better.
Professors are here to teach, not just teach but to give their knowledge to us becoming more and maybe even better than them. Sometimes they are the old ones, cranky ones who just gives lectures. Sometimes they are the most amazing prof you will ever meet and willing to share their life stories with you.
Asian kids aren’t smart at math because of stereotypes. They are good at math because of how their language works.
Introverts and extroverts are two different things that makes you yourself. Being a introvert may not be the best thing ever but it makes me go beyond what I am comfortable with and learn to smile at the hardest times.
Spending time with people you love is the best time you’ll ever have.
The sound of a fishing reel spinning fast! “I caught one! I caught one!” my dad yelled out. I’m stand next to my dad, tippy toeing and jumping to try and catch a glimpse of the fish. “Here,” my dad said. “Give it a go.” The moment I held the rod it was like getting the video game controller and fighting a boss. Reeling in as fast and careful as I can, it kept fighting back. The fish coming close to shore, you can see the white stripes as it shines against the sun as it came up slowly. The reel stopped spinning. My dad grabbed the fish for me, holding it in my hands, saying to myself “I’ve won”.
