As you look at the lives of famous people you may think “I could never be like that.” Bestselling author Robert Greene would most likely disagree with that statement. Greene has spent years studying highly successful people and has discovered that it’s not innate skill or genius that enables one to accomplish great achievements. Many of the famous people he studied were rather mediocre students (that was so encouraging to me) and they often came from poverty or broken homes. Greene asserts that mastery is a process can be achieved by ordinary people as they incorporate the following principles into their lives,
1. Discover your calling: the life’s task
2. Submit to reality: the ideal apprenticeship
3. Absorb the master’s power: the mentor dynamic
4. See people as they are: social intelligence
5. Awaken the dimensional mind: the creative-active
6. Fuse the intuitive with the rational: mastery
In an easy to read style, Greene illustrates these principles from the lives of highly successful people. He does not assert that it will be easy to achieve mastery – but it is possible if you’re willing to pay the price. G.K. Chesterton realized the challenge that novices encounter when attempting to live the Christian life, “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried.” The Apostle Paul provides encouragement for those who persevere,
. . . on the other hand, discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness; for bodily discipline is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. (1 Timothy 4:7b-8)
but I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified. (1 Corinthians 9:27)
As you consider developing mastery in an area of your life don’t neglect developing the discipline you need for living a godly life. What are some helpful practices you have discovered in mastering a skill?
Professor of Discipleship, Columbia International University
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