Jack of All Trades, Master of None!

I have always been a jack of all trades and master of none. It took a while to figure out why I am not able to master a particular thing and then I came across the term “Shiny object syndrome”.

Shiny Object syndrome is when you always look for new things and get more excited to try the new thing than what you are already doing.

In the Internet and technology there are plenty of Shiny Objects everyday. As I try to be upto date on the technology, I end up reading random tutorials on the internet on various topics like ReactJS, Python, Machine learning, NLP, Blockchain, Internet of Things, Raspberry Pi, Arduino and the list goes on. I download a lot of video tutorials and books. But I barely watch any of them.

It feels good to do beginner level things, but the problem is that I never really mastered anything. I took a step back and spent some time trying to understand why I do what I do and also talked about it with others. I found that one of the basic mistakes I made was not learning based on the first principle.

If you are a fan of Elon Musk you’ve already heard the term “First principles”.

In simple words, first principles is questioning every assumption you think you ‘know’ about a given problem down to the bottom and then creating new knowledge and solutions from scratch.

I quickly made a plan to break out of this habit. Below is the plan which I think will work for me,

• Plan for T shaped skills.

• Decide what I want to accomplish in the next 3 years. Aim for at least ONE YEAR.

• Make a list of achievable smaller goals.

• Prioritise the goals.

• Learn it; never work on more than two at a time.

• Teach it to others or write a blog tutorial.

• Find distractions and avoid them.

Reacting to shiny things isn’t bad as long as you learn or look at from the first principles.