They say if you practice something for 10,000 hours, you’ll become an expert at that thing.
But, as many of us know, it doesn’t really work that way. Maybe some of us just aren’t meant to be great guitar players or wonderful cooks.
AskReddit users shared the things they’ve practiced for 10,000 hours but they just can’t seem to get any better at…let’s see what they had to say.
1. Talking is hard.
“Talking without messing up at least once in a sentence.”
2. Not good at book learnin’.
“Education. I went through about 20 years of education and I still suck at learning anything.”
3. That’s too bad.
“I went to theater school and did compulsory free-dance classes for 1.5 hours every morning, plus other compulsory and elective short courses in jazz dance, ballet, tap, kabuki and noh movement, 20s dance crazes, Latin dance styles, ballroom, and other stuff. About 2,000 hours over three years.
I. still. can. not. dance.
I don’t mean not well, I mean not in the slightest. Not “well he’s not very good but he must have trained a bit”. Literally not one step. It’s as if I had never taken a single lesson in my life.
In fact it’s it’s worse than if I’d never done a lesson because I’m now so f*cking self-aware of my body and limbs if I try to dance that I can no longer let myself go and enjoy jumping about at parties or anything. Not even when drunk. Not even on my own – I judge myself and find myself wanting. It f*cking sucks.”
4. Not into it.
“Argue. It’s my job. I hate arguing.”
5. That’s a hard job.
“Teaching.
13 years, which is a little shy of 20,000 hours. I have no data to support the claim that I have, in any way, improved at my job, despite hundreds of hours of high quality professional development.
I have significant amounts of data to support the claim that I have gotten much worse at my job. Same class, same school district – my first year, 80% of my students passed the state exam. Last year, 42% passed, which is the average for the school district.
I’m not sure I have another 17 years of this in me.”
6. Can’t seem to focus.
“Studying. I have 3 degrees but within 5 mins of studying my brain still revolts and decides Netflix would be a much better plan.”
7. A lot of time with that controller in your hand.
“Gaming.
Being a gamer doesn’t mean being a good one.”
8. A slow swimmer.
“Swimming.
I’m on my high school swim team and have been swimming for years and my times are still terrible. I practice 2 hrs every Monday-Friday.
I do however have ehlers danlos syndrome which makes my joints super loose and unstable, so that’s what I think makes me slower than my peers.”
9. What am I doing here?
“Remembering stuff.
Every time I go to places or tell myself that I need to remember something only to be forget. I walk into a room just to be like “Snap, why did I come here?” only to go back and remember later.”
10. Everyone messes that up.
“Cook the right amount of pasta.”
11. Use your hours wisely.
“Guitar
I started playing in high school.
And Im in my mid thirties now.
I know some songs and can kind of F*ke it but can’t really jam with anyone nor do I know many techniques.
Ive realized that I just blew years on playing things I was comfortable with but never really challenged myself.
Ive learned at least this lesson, its not about how many hours you do something, its about what you do in those hours.”
12. Not improving. At all.
“I easily have 10,000+ hours on Minecraft.
I still can’t build nice houses.”
13. Takes a while to master.
“Typing.
All these years and I’m still terrible at it and often need too look down at the keyboard.”
14. That is sad. But don’t give up!
“Socialize, I can’t connect with people.”
15. You’re not alone on this one.
“Life in general.”
Damn, some of those are kind of heartbreaking, don’t you think?
What are some of the things you’ve practiced for hours and hours but you just can’t seem to get any better at?
Tell us all about it in the comments! Let’s compare notes!