How to hack the 10,000 hour rule

Ever wanted to be martial arts badass, fantasized about painting like Rembrandt or wished you could cook like Gordon Ramsey? Well as the now popular theory goes you need to rack up 10,000 hours to achieve mastery in a domain. So if you resolve to hammer away at your craft for 10 hours a day and 5 days a week it will take you all of 3 years, 10 months and 6 days to hit your 10,000 hours. Certainly not easy, but definitely achievable.

The allure of this simple “rule” is that it makes anything feel attainable, more than anything it is empowering. In theory, all you have to do is choose the thing you want to master, commit, add time and lo and behold we have ourselves a newly minted master. Once you embrace this rule, fate is yours.

While I do realize there are exceptions to this rule due to genetic limitations (I will probably never dunk like LeBron no matter how many times I try) I like this rule because it is simple and inspiring. However, I have also learned the hard way that I am much too intrigued by the next shiny potential skill to be one that is able to commit himself so diligently to that one thing day in and day out. Fortunately for me, there is another rule which I also tend to hold in high regard, yup you guessed it… the 80/20 rule. Otherwise known as the Pareto Principle, the 80/20 rule simply states that 80% of the results are usually achieved by 20% of the effort.

Ok, so what happens if we merge these 2 rules to get as far as possible in mastering a new skill set while spending as little time as possible.

10,000 hours * 20% effort = 2,000 hours (or 9 months and 11 days of 10 hours a day / 5 days a week practice)

In other words, while it takes roughly 3 years and 10 months to achieve 100% mastery of a skill, it would only take roughly 9 months to get 80% of the way there! Doesn’t that sound like a bargain? It does to me. Instead of spending all that time trying to get to 100% of 1 skill I could spend the same amount of time getting to 80% of 5 different skills! I bet the synergies that could come from combining 5 different skills could in their own right produce something at least equally as awe inspiring as someone who is at 100% of their 1 skill.

Well, what happens if we apply this rule again? Again you say Dr.8020?! What sorcery is this? Ok, here we go…

2,000 hours * 20% effort = 400 hours (2 months at 10 hours a day / 5 days a week)

80% skill level * 80% = 64% skill level

So that comes out to spending a measly 2 months to getting to 64% mastery of a skill. Pretty cool. Being pretty amused by this discovery (and a little bit of a nerd) I ended up putting together a chart to see what it looked like to keep going down this rabbit hole and applying the rule to itself. Check it out:

So in theory, while it may take 10,000 hours to reach 100% mastery of a skill it would only take you just over 3 hours to get 33% of the way there. That is not a bad return on investment if you ask me. Sounds as simple as taking 3, 1-hour intro classes in any one domain. However, the law of diminishing returns kicks in pretty fast and you have to add another 397 hours to near double that skill level and get to 64%.

There you have it, by combining these 2 rules we see that the path to becoming a true jack of all trades is by reaping the rewards of the high return that comes with the first few hours of deliberate practice of a new skill. Prefer the slow and focused path of mastery? I certainly respect that and the world is all the richer for your efforts. I for one will be spending the next few hours on finally moving my drawing skills outside the stickman-esque phase it has been stuck in since the 2nd grade.

Happy learning!

Want to hear from us when a new post comes out? Subscribe below

This story is published in The Startup, Medium’s largest entrepreneurship publication followed by 328,729+ people.

Subscribe to receive our top stories here.