The Mundanity of an Excellent Life
In the spring of 1989, Daniel F. Chambliss published an article entitled,
“The Mundanity of Excellence: an Ethnographic Report on Stratification and Olympic Swimmers.” Sounds like an exciting read, huh? Well actually, it is. This 24-page research article discusses the nature of excellence and how talent does not necessarily lead to excellence. Excellence is ultimately the culmination of dozens of sub-skills that have been deliberately and relentlessly practiced over a period of days, weeks, months, and years. Chambliss states that excellence is consistently superior performance. The “stratification” is a reference to the varying levels of ability and performance. I read this article years ago and as a coach and a teacher, I was fascinated by this research and what it could mean on the courts and in the classroom and we develop athletes and students.
In “The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance,” a 900+ page book edited and co-written by K.Anders Ericsson, he states that “consistently and overwhelmingly, the evidence showed that experts are always made, not born.” Expert performance is within grasp of anyone willing to invest an enormous amount of time practicing deliberately, guided by knowledgeable mentors and coaches that provide honest, timely feedback. I first heard about Ericsson in Daniel Coyle’s book, The Talent Code. These books also guided my development as a coach and teacher as I searched for ways to help develop athletic and academic growth and performance.
Over the past few months, I’ve been focusing more time on my own growth and development. Not so much as a coach and teacher, but more as someone looking to live a more compelling life. In my quest to build a well-lived life, my focus has shifted to creating peace and joy in my day to day life. This involves a mindset and perspective that each day is a practice and each day is an opportunity to close the gap between my current self and my best self. As I looked for ways to grow, I began thinking about the mundane daily work necessary to become an expert and the mundane daily work to build this excellent life. It hit me that I could approach my daily life in the same way that Chambliss and Ericsson discussed in their research.
So what does the mundanity of a well-lived life look like? To me, it requires practice, habits, and systems. Building a well-lived life requires a deliberate plan along with daily attention. It requires hours, days, weeks, and years of work that looks like a natural talent or a gift to the observer but quite mundane to the practitioner. There is nothing dazzling about getting up at 5am to read, write, and work out before work. There is nothing amazing about spending time in silence and contemplation. There is nothing remarkable about building a few simple habits and practicing them consistently. I don’t know that I’ve achieved excellence and expertise yet, but I am certainly enjoying the mundanity, because in this mundanity, I am most certainly living well.
Photo by Monty Allen on Unsplash
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