There are levels to a lot of things in life. Take college football for example. There are different football divisions: Division II, Division 1AA, and Division I (highest level). That said, the level of talent found in Division I ball is quite different than the level of talent found in Division II football. A Division II player would likely find it difficult to play against Division I players while a Division I player would likely find it easier to compete against Division II players. There are, at times, exceptions.

We read a fascinating study by Daniel Chambliss titled “The Mundanity of Excellence” that analyzed the differences between Olympic and lower-class levels of swimmers to describe why different levels exist in various domains of life and how one can level up in their chosen craft/field if desired. This article is a distillation of insights from Daniel’s piece that align with findings in Robert Greene’s book, Mastery, that we believe can help someone improve in their chosen craft(s).

It’s not always the amount of hours you put in

It can be easy to look at practice one-dimensionally and view quantitative metrics like practice hours and rep numbers as the primary route to improved performance. Chambliss’s study however revealed that world-class swimmers see practice two-dimensionally and emphasize qualitative things like eating habits, swimming technique, and attitude as important components of their training regiments.

In his study, Chambliss classified different levels of swimming as different “worlds.” To his and our surprise, Chambliss saw that each world of swimmers shared similar quantitatively focused practice habits .  For example, someone from world A and world B would practice the same amount of hours. If this is the case one may wonder what then separates two worlds from each other.

Chambliss’s study revealed that there were significant qualitative differences between worlds and this likely explained the key difference between worlds. For example, Chambliss mentioned that swimming techniques between worlds A and C are so different that someone in World C would be amazed to see the swimming styles of those in higher worlds while someone in World A would fail to recognize the swimming style of World C.

Qualitative changes not practice hours are sometimes the missing piece to leveling up

Chambliss hypothesized that quantitative improvements likely help one out-compete individuals in the same world but rarely provide a means to upgrade a level or compete with those in higher worlds. To level up a world(s), one must adopt the training techniques, attitudes, etc, of the higher world and practice with those new set of qualitative standards . In other words, “Excellence… is achieved through qualitative differentiation… not through quantitative increases in activity.”…“Athletes move up to the top ranks through qualitative jumps: noticeable changes in their techniques, discipline, and attitude, accomplished usually through a change in environment (e.g., joining a new team with a new coach, new friends, etc.) who operate and work at a higher level.”

Takeaway: Don’t let the “If you’re not putting in the hours, you’re not serious about success” narrative about greatness distract you from finding qualitative changes you may need to make to level up.

Mentors and coaches can teach and share important qualitative changes to make

The commonly shared advice to seek out mentors, coaches, or someone more experienced in your craft area at times, goes in one ear and out the other. Chambliss’s report makes the value of this advice more apparent. The right mentorship and coaching can show one what qualitative habits one needs to pick up to optimize their chances of moving up a world. To crystallize this understanding, I encourage you to walk through this thought experiment:

Let’s say you’re in World C for some type of activity or craft you care about. Maybe it’s writing, photography, a sport, filmmaking, make-up, etc. You value self-improvement so you are interested in moving to World B (next level). This article hopefully helps you see that you’ll likely have to make qualitative changes but what changes should those be? Can you answer that question right now? Unless you’re clairvoyant, it’ll be difficult to know what qualitative habits of the next level to adopt unless you see them for yourself or are told what they are. How can you get this information? Some options are to interact with someone who has been in World B which can be a new friend, a mentor, a coach, or even a book written by someone describing what happens in that world. Of course, you can play a game of experimentation and try new things but unless one has no other option, you may be able to get answers from direct sources and short-circuit the amount of experimentation you’ll have to do.

Learning and adopting new qualitative changes: A real-life fitness example from a client

“I had an encounter at work that exemplifies why mentorship is important for making the right qualitative changes. A friend of mine started a fitness challenge with her sister and wanted to win. At the time I regularly lifted ~four times a week and completed a fitness journey of my own. I leveraged several books and hired trainers as aides so I had a sense for assessing whether someone’s approach would yield the results they wanted. I asked about her workout routine and eating habits and identified two missteps that would probably slow her progress. 1.) She was going to prioritize cardio over weight lifting and 2.) She didn’t know that keeping protein intake high would help. Without the support of personal trainers who showed and taught me the standards of a higher fitness world along with the different fitness books I read, I may not have been able to identify her two missteps. I shared that she could use protein powder–nowadays I’d recommend protein from whole food sources– to increase her protein intake and that prioritizing a women’s workout program over running everyday would likely increase her metabolism and stimulate more muscle growth. With this newfound knowledge she can practice new habits, accelerate her fat loss journey, and level up to a higher fitness level.“

Excellence is mundane

It can be easy to think that greatness comes from doing grand things. If our client’s friend follows their advice while maintaining her other fitness-supporting habits, she may start fielding the question, “How did you do it?!” The answer wouldn’t be anything “special” that others can’t do, but her success resulted from consistently practicing a string of multiple small habits.

Chambliss touched upon this to help people see that performing at desired levels doesn’t always require you to do great feats of work. Chambliss asserted that elite performance “is really a confluence of dozens of small skills or activities, each one learned or stumbled upon, which have been carefully drilled into habit and then are fitted together in a synthesized whole. There is nothing extraordinary or super-human in any one of those actions; only the fact that they are done consistently and correctly, and all together, produce excellence.” I agree with his perspective and will share a swimming example from his piece to further illustrate the insight:

When a swimmer learns a proper flip turn in the freestyle race, he or she will swim the race a bit faster; then a streamlined push off from the wall, with the arms squeezed together over the head, and a little faster; then how to place the hands in the water so no air is cupped in them; then how to lift them over the water; then how to lift weights to properly build strength, and how to eat the right foods, and to wear the best suits for racing, and on and on. Each of those tasks seems small in itself, but each one allows the athlete to swim a bit faster. As a swimmer eventually learns and consistently practices all of them together, [as well as other performance improving tactics] the swimmer may [eventually reach a level of performance that is] worthy of competing in the Olympic Games. The simple practice of doing certain small tasks can generate huge results. Excellence is mundane.

Daniel Chambliss

Crawl, Walk, Run

Overcoming the fleetness of motivation sparks often necessitates turning a long-term goal into day-to-day steps we can focus on. As humans, we can at times struggle with viewing the gap between where we are and where we would like to be in a negative light. This point of view can lead to negative emotions like anxiety and disappointment. Thoughts of, “Can I really do this and become what I want? How am I going to get there?” can run rampant through our minds. Chambliss provided insights into how Olympic-level swimmers overcome this mindset challenge.

Chambliss describing how swimmers breakdown their long-term goals into small achievable steps

Let your uniqueness shine through

In the pursuit of excellence there often comes a time when you’re best performance comes when you perform things your own unique way. A way that feels most comfortable and right for you. This unique approach may differ than from what’s considered the best practice but that doesn’t matter if your approach produces your desired outcomes. Individuals who break the rules and outperform the competition are sometimes called masters of their crafts. People (ex: Steph Curry) who redefine what it means to be the best at what they do. Some people reach this level from studying and modifying historical best practices of the past. You keep what feels right for you and discard what doesn’t Robert Greene has commentary on this in his book Mastery we’ve included below.

“The greatest impediment to creativity is your impatience, the almost inevitable desire to hurry up the process, express something, and make a splash. What happens in such a case is that you do not master the basics; you have no real vocabulary at your disposal. What you mistake for being creative and distinctive is more likely an imitation of other people’s style, or personal rantings that do not really express anything. Audiences, however, are hard to fool. They feel the lack of rigor, the imitative quality, the urge to get attention, and they turn their backs, or give the mildest praise that quickly passes. The best route is to follow Coltrane and to love learning for its own sake Anyone “who would spend ten years absorbing the techniques and conventions of their field, trying them out, mastering them, exploring and personalizing them, would inevitably find their authentic voice and give birth to something unique and expressive.”

Closing

We think the lessons from this piece pair well with the moments of inspiration you may feel when encountering something Glamorous. In that article, we describe how glamour can help bring clarity to the things you genuinely desire or provide evidence that your goals can be realized. When you discover your genuine desires and combine that discovery with the understanding that excellence is mundane, you have a blueprint to turn dreams into reality.

Cheers,

Chambliss, Daniel F. “The Mundanity of Excellence: An Ethnographic Report on Stratification and Olympic Swimmers.” Sociological Theory, vol. 7, no. 1, 1989, pp. 70–86. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/202063.

NFL Example of qualitative difference: This is a youtube video of NFL wide receiver, Tyreek Hill, sharing a workout of his. Many viewers thanked him for giving them insight and direction for the type of drills and techniques they should train to level up their abilities.