Why do I want to be an expert or achieve mastery in every industry / topic I enter?
That’s kinda wishful thinking. To be so in saturated topics and industries. I explored this a bit in a previous entry but let’s go deeper. Maybe I find the intersections of things to create whole genres and then I become the de facto master in that. Lol maybe I become the best jack of all trades person. The most things that I have a superficial but satisfactory knowledge about.
Or I could approach it as every 5-10 years, what do I want to be world-class in?
Is mastery different from world-class? No. I think they can be synonymous. My full-time job is essentially what I want to be a master in. So let’s say I live another 50 years. I theoretically can be world-class in 5-10 industries / topics. So the question is what are those?
I want to choose intentionally. The thing is 99% of people don’t become world-class in anything, let alone 5-10 things. This is quite an ambitious goal. But I can shorten the timespan of becoming an expert if I choose certain topics.
What are those factors? Saturation. Novelty - how long has it been an industry. There will probably be more experts on a topic if that subject has been around for 1000s of years compared to a few years. It’s the same approach as niching down your ideal client avatar. If I target very specific niches, no one else can compete with me. Or they’ll have to put in the leg work to “catch up.”
Novelty is actually a dimension of saturation. Depth is another factor. Do I have 30% knowledge on a topic or 75%? That’s tough to gauge though because what is 100% knowledge in any area?
So the question isn’t “how much knowledge do I have about it currently?” The better question is “how do I keep learning more about that topic?”
The best ways that I learn are by experiencing and writing. The only thing right now that I’d say I’m in the top 1% of globally is knowing myself. There’s an infinite amount of things to still learn about myself but I think I have a decent grasp on myself.
Which is kinda sad to say. That by doing this, a minimal amount of work, I’m already in an (arbitrary) top 1%.
I become more confident in whatever the topic is by writing about it and experiencing. I’ve gotten to that place by hundreds, perhaps thousands (?) of hours of journaling in the last few years. And then applying that self-assurance through my daily experiences. So whatever I write about I have the potential to become an expert in.
The Life OS book that I’m writing will be a way to achieve world-class status on that topic. Perhaps I need to write a book on laundromat marketing to supercharge that identity shift.
[Side note: I want to be around other world-class performers all the time. I get why people pay $1000s and $10,000s to go see someone like Federer or Nadal play. The pinnacle of that activity. Game recognize game. Greatness respects greatness. The detail that Will Guidara showed in Eleven Madison Park’s episode on 7 Days Out on Netflix is a Steve Jobs level of persistence and meticulousness. I can inculcate that in myself. I see some of that in Dan.]
Doing a quick Google search, there doesn’t appear to be any book on laundromat marketing specifically. Definitely a place where I can exercise some expertise. Perhaps I start documenting everything that we’re doing, which I’ve already been doing for the past year or so. Then the content for the book is already there. OK! Let’s do it. Laundropreneurs: How LaundroLab Suddenly Became a Household Name. That’s my ticket to speaking on stage at 2025 Clean Show. Let’s have a 1st draft done by EOY 2023.
What other topics? Organizational OS. There’s a bit more saturation in that one so there will have to be results behind it. Or will there? I think that’s a false dependency. I can still be an expert if I write the book and it’s not fully implemented. Now if it’s fully implemented and it doesn’t work, then there’s an issue.
By my previous logic, I should have written at least 5-10 books in my life. Books have great leverage as well. Digital content is quickly replaceable. But books last forever.
So to answer the original question, I want to because of legacy; my ideas shared forever and shaping future generations. I think legacy from a 10-20% place of lack / fear and 80-90% from a place of wealth / love.
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