11–20 of 299 posts
I have played couple of games competitively. I have been somewhere in top ten to top three in the world in some of them (we are talking small communities with large number of accidental players, nothing really to brag about). My observation is it is critical to somehow get a feeling what it is/means to be good at the game. This means identifying where is the focus of a good player. Having been playing competitively I…
This sounds like some great advice for real life...
In college I really struggled with math. Which was a challenge because computer science has you take a lot of math classes. In my calculus class I studied so hard for the final. Did every problem in the book. And I still just got a B in the class.
At the same time my programming classes were really easy. I didn't study at all and the homework was trivial.
Based on my interviewing history I'm not in the 95th percentile of programmers - I'm routinely outright rejected and don't even land the on-site interview. And this is basically my best skill for which I've invested an enormous amount of time and energy.
The movie Amadeus really nails this idea. Salieri has one goal in life: to create beautiful music. And he achieved some success, but then he meets Mozart - " a boastful, lustful, smutty infantile boy..." - yet he creates the most amazing music he's ever heard.
> All I wanted was to sing to God. He gave me that longing... and then made me mute. Why? Tell me that. If He didn't want me to praise him with music, why implant the desire? Like a lust in my body! And then deny me the talent?
I've experienced that frustration many times in my life.
Salieri is a tragic figure though - his response is one of contempt and hostility to the injustice of his life. But he's missed the point. All success and talent in life is a gift.
Maybe your frustrations in life are an opportunity to teach you humility and to be gracious to others.
I have played couple of games competitively. I have been somewhere in top ten to top three in the world in some of them (we are talking small communities with large number of accidental players, nothing really to brag about). My observation is it is critical to somehow get a feeling what it is/means to be good at the game. This means identifying where is the focus of a good player. Having been playing competitively I…
On the flip side. Sometimes you're just not that good at stuff despite your best efforts. In college I really struggled with math. Which was a challenge because computer science has you take a lot of math classes. In my calculus class I studied so hard for the final. Did every problem in the book. And I still just got a B in the class. At the same time my programming classes were really easy. I didn't study at all an…
I came to understand we all stand on a spectrum. For everybody there's someone better, and someone not as good. So what? Do what you can with the skills you have, and you're doing more than 99% of the people who squander what they have.
I have played couple of games competitively. I have been somewhere in top ten to top three in the world in some of them (we are talking small communities with large number of accidental players, nothing really to brag about). My observation is it is critical to somehow get a feeling what it is/means to be good at the game. This means identifying where is the focus of a good player. Having been playing competitively I…
Smash bro’s for instance, has a ton of players who know about advanced techniques, and talk about some of them as easy because they are easy for top players, but cannot actually execute on any of them.
And, like you say, mistake the fact that some of the advanced techniques are done by professional players to mean that utilizing these techniques are an important part of getting there. They’re generally not.
On the flip side. Sometimes you're just not that good at stuff despite your best efforts. In college I really struggled with math. Which was a challenge because computer science has you take a lot of math classes. In my calculus class I studied so hard for the final. Did every problem in the book. And I still just got a B in the class. At the same time my programming classes were really easy. I didn't study at all an…
Sure Mozart was better that Salieri, but there is just one Mozart.
Companies are always talking about how they just take the best, but in the end they have to settle with what the market gives them.
On the flip side. Sometimes you're just not that good at stuff despite your best efforts. In college I really struggled with math. Which was a challenge because computer science has you take a lot of math classes. In my calculus class I studied so hard for the final. Did every problem in the book. And I still just got a B in the class. At the same time my programming classes were really easy. I didn't study at all an…
I learned this at a young age. Leaving my small community where I was the smartest, most educated person I knew. I went to college where there were easily 1/3 of the class doing as well or better. I came to understand we all stand on a spectrum. For everybody there's someone better, and someone not as good. So what? Do what you can with the skills you have, and you're doing more than 99% of the people who squander wh…
Even the example he gave didn't really work: He says that the top 30% of players in Overwatch can reasonable be expected to want to win. Which I agree with (it's probably an underestimation) - but does this mean that the bottom 70% only "participate"? Because that would mean to get into the 95th percentile of "people who practice", you would have to be in the 1.5th percentile of Overwatch players.
Another layer of this problem exists when you look at people who play the game regularly, but don't play ranked. On average, those players are probably worse - but should they be included in the percentile?
Ultimately the percentile thing just doesn't make much sense, but I still think the overall message of the blog post, that most people could improve at something they do at a much faster rate if they were willing/able to really focus on improving themselves and less on external factors that they can't control, is absolutely true.
I disagree when the post claims that "advice works". If someone gives you good advice and you manage to take it, you're still missing something. You're mising the intuition that led them to be able to give you that advice, which is the really valuable thing. This is why self-help is so worthless, even if it's good advice.
95th percentile for an SAT score is something like 1450. That's fairly impressive to me. Feels like scoring higher might often have more to do with effort than ability. Is that excluded from the line of thought in the blog post because it's among "people who regularly practice?" Or is it that effort vs ability thing? Not impressive because you were born smart? In a totally "no effort" arena, 95th percentile height fo…
Everyone in school is practicing at least a bit on reading comprehension, and the SAT is across lots of schools, if you are the in 95%-ile of millions of people it might be more impressive than being in the 95%-ile of tens of thousands of people.