When we think of someone developing remarkable talent, the assumption is often that they were “born with it”—that the skilled musician, athlete, or writer somehow just had the knack. But what if the true secret to developing talent wasn’t about inherent skill, but rather how you practice?
In The Talent Code: Greatness Isn’t Born, It’s Grown, author Daniel Coyle explores this idea in depth, suggesting that the most powerful practice isn’t necessarily what feels good or comfortable. Instead, true skill-building lies at the edge of our abilities, where errors and corrections form our strongest growth.
In his research, Coyle found that effective practice, often called “deliberate practice,” is a systematic approach where you focus on the limits of your abilities, make mistakes, and learn from them.
It’s a kind of practice that’s challenging, even frustrating, yet its impact is profound.
Let’s explore how deliberate practice transforms learning and how we can apply it in our own lives.
The paradox of deliberate practice
To see deliberate practice in action, imagine a violinist learning a complex piece of music. When she plays it all the way through, she’s simply “playing.” She might feel the rhythm and enjoy the melody, but her mind doesn’t analyze each note or section carefully. When she slows down to focus on a particularly challenging passage, however, she hovers at the edge of her abilities. Here, deliberate practice is happening: her brain is recognizing where she stumbles, taking time to correct her fingers, rhythm, or bow technique.
This process can feel clunky and even discouraging at times. But, paradoxically, that’s precisely what builds fluency. Through each slow, targeted repetition, her brain creates more efficient circuits, ultimately leading to faster and smoother play.
It’s like paving a mental road, brick by brick, until it becomes easy to navigate. Once mastered, those moments of frustration turn into beautifully fluid performances that look effortless.
The hidden secret? They only feel effortless because of all that hard work beforehand.
Story: The Chess Champion and the Tennis Player
Imagine two learners: one is a young chess player who plays dozens of games every day against stronger opponents. His improvement is slow, despite his commitment. In contrast, a tennis player with a coach who emphasizes deliberate practice has a very different experience. Each day, she practices specific techniques—footwork, backhand, forehand volleys—and focuses on her mistakes rather than breezing through a whole game. As a result, her skills improve much more quickly because she’s targeting her weaknesses directly.
Why the difference? Chess can be improved by playing repeatedly, but without focused, deliberate practice, the player learns only general tactics. The tennis player, however, operates in a “talent hotbed,” deliberately targeting weak spots and correcting them. This kind of training isn’t glamorous—it’s humbling, exhausting, and sometimes uncomfortable. But it works.
What deliberate practice isn’t
It’s easy to think that any type of practice is good practice. But while many approaches offer great experiences, they aren’t deliberate practice:
Playing or Performing: Simply playing chess matches or tennis games won’t lead to rapid improvement. While you might pick up some skills over time, improvement is slow without targeted attention to mistakes.
Step-by-Step Tutorials: Following along with a tutorial is helpful when you’re learning a new skill, like coding or cooking, but it doesn’t actively engage the brain to correct mistakes.
Projects: Projects are fun and great for learning, but they’re usually about discovery and problem-solving. You might learn video editing by making a video, but you aren’t intentionally repeating a specific technique, like how to cut scenes perfectly.
Building the skill of learning: exercises you can do to experience deliberate practice
If you’re excited about learning how to learn better, here are some ways you can start implementing deliberate practice. These exercises focus on identifying your weak spots and actively improving them.
1. Slow down and focus on mistakes
When practicing a skill, slow down to focus on areas you find difficult. If you’re learning a musical instrument, take a piece you struggle with and play it slowly. Feel the difficulty in each note, correct the mistakes, and play it again. The next time you try, notice how it gets a bit smoother.
Exercise: Choose a skill you’re working on (like playing guitar, painting, or coding) and identify one tricky area. Spend 20 minutes working only on that part. Repeat until it feels smoother, even if it’s uncomfortable at first.
2. Break down big projects
Instead of diving headfirst into a project, break it down into skills that can be deliberately practiced. If you’re learning photography, don’t just go out and shoot. Focus on lighting one day, angles the next. These targeted sessions build skill in less time.
Exercise: Think about a project you’ve been wanting to work on (like writing a story or creating a website). List the individual skills it requires. Spend short, intense sessions focused on practicing just one part, like creating headlines or adjusting light settings.
3. Embrace the mistakes
One of the hardest parts of deliberate practice is that it requires you to make mistakes. The discomfort of error is what pushes you to grow. Remind yourself that mistakes are a sign that you’re improving.
Exercise: For one week, start each practice session by listing out potential mistakes you might make. This might be as simple as “miss a note” or “struggle with a formula.” As you practice, make a check mark each time you make one. Celebrate each mark as a sign that you’re targeting weaknesses and improving.
Embracing a growth mindset in learning
Coyle’s work reminds us that talent isn’t a mysterious gift reserved for the lucky. With the right kind of practice, almost anyone can build incredible skills. If we stay in our comfort zones, improvement is slow. But if we push ourselves to the edges of our ability, deliberately embracing the difficulty of error, real growth happens.
This kind of practice is like lifting weights for the brain. It’s effortful, sometimes frustrating, and requires a focus on our weaknesses. Yet over time, it’s the most reliable way to build skill and, in the end, feel that seemingly effortless flow.
Learning how to learn is not what you think. It’s not simply reading or practicing something you already find easy to get even better. It’s deliberately doing the hard thing, making mistakes, correcting the mistakes which cements the learning further, and continuing.
Becky Gosky, Neuro Shift