by Zoë Pollock
That's Ed Smith's recipe for success:
In his study of talented young musicians in Berlin, K Anders Ericsson asked what separated the outstanding soloists from those who were merely good. The difference was not – as is often misquoted – that the best players practised more. Instead, they practised intensely and then allowed themselves more time to relax and recoup. … The idea that being good at something demands harried, exhausted martyrdom is a relatively new idea. “Only in recent history,” as Nassim Nicholas Taleb puts it, “has ‘working hard’ signalled pride rather than shame for lack of talent, finesse and, mostly, sprezzatura.” If we really want to be good at something, we should stop wasting time exhausting ourselves.
The Dish 