What’s one thing you’d do happily, for 10,000 hours?

I used to think mastery was just accumulation. Put in the time, show up every day, let compounding do its thing. Log enough reps and eventually you get good.

Then I hit a 4 month plateau in the gym. Wrote 40 posts that went nowhere. Built tools that I didn’t ship. Same effort. Same consistency. Not to say that didn’t teach me how to do better, but…

That’s when it clicked: reps don’t make you better. iterations do.

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Let’s dive in.

10,000 hours means nothing if you're repeating the same mistakes 10,000 times.

Most people think showing up is enough. it's not.

the gap between good and great is the velocity of learning.

most people skip the review part.

I’ve put ~1,000 hours into fitness over the last 2.5 years and ~12,400 hours, writing since I started at 16. Somehow, it still feels like nothing.

here's the truth: the people who break through are extracting more from every rep. every session is data. every post is a test. every launch is feedback. if you're not closing the loop between action and learning, you're not compounding skill. you're just getting tired.

The Mamba Mentality is one of my favorite books that gives perspective on what used to happen behind the scenes.

Kobe Bryant filmed every practice to study it.

every missed shot became a pattern he could fix. every movement got refined. he wasn't just putting in hours. he was building a system to extract leverage from them.

Hemingway rewrote the ending of A Farewell to Arms 47 times, because he was iterating toward something better.

the pattern is universal: mastery isn't about time logged. it's about feedback loops closed.

here's what I do every Sunday.

block 20 minutes to review:

> what worked this week?

> what didn't?

> what pattern am I missing?

> what's the next test?

I check my training log for patterns. review which content got saved. look at what actually moved growth. takes 20 minutes. but those 20 minutes are where improvement lives. the work gives you reps. the review gives you leverage. you need both.

quick reminder: progress happens during recovery, not execution.
your muscles grow during rest.
your brain consolidates learning during sleep.
insights surface during walks, not grind sessions.
if you're going 100% all the time, you're not maximizing growth. you're burning capacity.

work hard. recover harder. that's how you sustain the long game.

THE TAKEAWAY

10,000 hours is a starting point, not a finish line.

what separates plateau from breakthrough is showing up, reviewing what happened, and adjusting based on what you learned.

train like an athlete. iterate like an artist. measure like a founder.

that's how you compound.