The Problem With Focusing On Many Things
The problem with focusing on many things is that you remain a generalist. You fail to go deeper in understanding, learning about a topic, or mastering a skill.
The temptation is to focus on many things rather than one thing. By directing your attention to many things, you are preventing yourself from discovering your natural skills. The longer you think that you must be skilled in many things you delay discovering the one thing that you are most adept at. You become a “Jack of all trades, master of none.”
“If you chase two rabbits, you will catch neither one.” - Publilius Syrus
“Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least.” - Russian Proverb
“Efficiency is doing the thing right. Effectiveness is doing the right thing.” - Goethe
The Problem With Focusing On Many Things
The issue with focusing on many things is that you will only have shallow knowledge of a topic or a skill. This will make you less competitive because you need more expertise. You are a generalist and may know many things, but you must be more knowledgeable.
You give yourself the illusion of flexibility by thinking you must know about or be skilled in many things. This delusion keeps you from mastering a skill.
As a generalist, you are replaceable. You need to gain deep knowledge of a topic or expertise in an area that sets you apart from your peers. This is why low-paying jobs can be done by anyone. Those jobs do not require a specific or deep understanding of a topic. They are simply not highly regarded in the marketplace.
Focusing on many things is like being limited to staying at the shallow end of the pool. Your area of expertise may cover many areas, but it cannot target somewhere specific. You will remain a generalist if you lack focus in your skillset.
Any of us will continue to be an amateur in many things if we never decide to narrow it down. One person just cannot do everything. It is best to focus on the things that you are best at. Discover a niche and stick to it.
Learning About Yourself In Your Twenties
While you are in your teens and twenties, you are still figuring out what you are best at. During this time, it is natural to try many things until you discover what you enjoy doing and your skills. The sooner you figure that out, the better. You must know yourself first to learn your skills. But when you are still learning about yourself is different from always continuing to focus your attention on a broad range of things.
The sooner you discover what you are best at, the sooner you will stop forcing yourself to do things you are not good at.
Why You Want To Focus On One Thing
“Success demands a singleness of purpose.” - Peter Drucker
You move to the pool's deep end when you focus on one thing. You prevent your success by focusing on shiny objects and trying to learn about everything. You want to begin by finding what comes naturally to you. You want to start to master a skill. Once you discover that one thing, you can stop trying hard and experience success.
When you start to spend time studying or developing a skill, you learn about all the other parts that connect to the core skill. You can implement things as necessary to resolve a problem. This is because you can understand the bigger picture. After all, you have a depth of knowledge, and you can use that extensive knowledge to join related topics or use tools needed to accomplish a task. These are interconnected areas of knowledge or skills that you consistently use that fit a theme.
Develop Skills That Fit A Theme
You can always move on to learn a new skill once you have become proficient in one skill. This does not mean that you only become a master of one thing, and you can find complementary skills that overlap. This means you dominate an area while knowing other things that accompany your primary skill.
You may have a range of skills that fit a specific theme. These skills are interconnected around a subject matter. The skills connect.
For example, you may be good at video editing. You know how to use one or two of the top programs. You also know the best sites where you can use copyright-free b-roll videos and audio to avoid getting penalized by YouTube and penalized for using copyrighted video and audio. You only know these things because you have spent enough time doing it. You may have had a bad experience with a client when you started dealing with copyright over a video and learned the hard way.
You can learn the related skills or areas of knowledge to understand the theme that connects to your core topic or skill.
Learn To Delegate
The next step is to learn to delegate. By developing expertise within a theme or overlapping fields, you understand topics and skills that connect. But you also know your limitations with your skills. This is when you learn the art of delegation. You start to recognize when you must have someone else do things for which you lack the skills.
This is when you hire someone to do the work for you. You may not be good at accounting. You hire an accountant. You don’t know how to fix an electrical outlet that broke. You hire an electrician. You don’t want to deal with digital marketing all of the time. You hire a digital marketing manager.
You cannot do everything. Focus on what you are best at. Everything else, delegate.
How I Fell For The Many Things Trap
I used to think that it was best to focus on many things. I would broadly learn about topics and skills that interested me. I would read books on these topics or decide to study them more formally at college. Some of these topics included politics, law, and cybersecurity. All of those things I was interested in for some time. But they were never my one thing.
Interestingly enough, my one thing was my website which I started in college. Following that is writing. I remember my senior year of college when my gut told me I should write a book. This was a little while after starting the website. Ignoring my intuition, I delayed writing a book for about seven years. I did all the things that were not my strengths and was a master of none.
I now understand that my website is the central platform. The other platforms are helpful, but you remain dependent upon a third party that could decide to limit your growth at any time. Books are just one tool that can be used to make money online today. There are then different types of books. The main book can then have study aids or workbooks and a journal that goes along with it.
Please don’t fall for the generalist trap like I did. Don’t ignore your intuition. Master a skill.
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Summary
By focusing on many things, you will remain stuck because you always need to dominate a skill, topic, or area of knowledge. Mastery requires focusing on an item until you know and understand it. It is up to you to learn what the top skills are that you want to master to have success. To do that, you must first know yourself.
You must decide if you want to be a generalist or a master. You cannot be both.
Become A Secure Single.
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