The Illusion of Mastery

It is easy to imagine mastery as the end of the road. A master has arrived—he has become the best he could possibly be. MLB pitcher R.A. Dickey offers a different take on mastery. (You can hear the full interview on which this article is based here.) During the first peak in his career, R.A. Dickey succeeded as a closer throwing a fastball. But as he aged his speed began to decline. He could have quit, but instead he reinvented himself as a knuckleball pitcher. 

To give you a sense of how difficult this is, it helps to know that there have only been a few dozen full time knuckleballers in the entire history of baseball. This is because the ball must be thrown in such a way that it makes less than a quarter rotation for the entire trajectory of its flight, making the pitch slow and very risky. So why throw a knuckleball? 

This mesmerizing slow-motion video reveals why. The ball holds almost perfectly still as it flies through the air and just as it gets near the batter, it veers in a completely unpredictable direction. This makes it extremely difficult to hit a well-thrown knuckleball. But if the pitch isn’t done just right, the ball won’t veer and the batter gets an easy-to-hit, slow target. This is why so few pitchers have taken the time to perfect this pitch.

R.A. Dickey spent five whole years learning how to throw a knuckleball. He even had to move back down to the minors to do so. Once he returned to the majors, however, he became one of the greatest pitchers of all time. In order to throw knuckleballs consistently, he had a discipline of over 112 singular commitments to adhere to over the course of a game. He even asked himself questions like, “How do I live the next 30 seconds well?” 

One thing that is clear in the interview is that R.A. Dickey never felt like he had arrived at mastery. Over the course of his career, he kept exploring what he was capable of and how he might improve. I invite you to consider R.A. Dickey’s story as an analogy for your life by considering the following questions: 

Where in my life do I feel like I have settled or arrived at mastery? What if it were possible to reinvent myself in a surprising way? What would my new “pitch” be? 

In what area of my life do I want to become truly great? What specific commitments would be my discipline for achieving this greatness?

God bless,
Dan