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Maikel's Mindset Minute: Break It Down to Build It Up

Learn any skill WAY faster by breaking it down into small sub-skills. Make progress by mastering them one at a time.

Why are soft skill so much harder to build than hard skills?

Hard skills are more obvious.

If I wanted to learn how to play the piano, I have a clear path. I would need to learn how to read music sheets, where to place my hands, what keys play what notes, how to move my hands, melody, chords, and a lot of other things.

Question:

If I asked you to learn how to be charismatic or confident, how will you learn it?

Take a moment to think about it.

Can you think of a plan for learning it?

Most soft skills are just easy terms to use.

Everyone knows what you mean when you say that someone is charismatic, confident, empathic, or a great leader. We use those words for easy communication. In conversation we would say something like “John is so confident, I’m quite jealous.”

Here’s what we don’t say:

“John….

  • has defined clear goals for himself,

  • is working diligently towards them,

  • has defined his core values,

  • lives by his core values,

  • has spent years becoming a competent man,

  • spent the time to resolve past trauma

  • talks to himself positively

  • uses positive reinforcement daily

  • etc. etc.

Rather than using the above descriptions, we simply call John confident.

Over to you:

What (soft) skill are you trying to learn?

Pick one or two and write them down on a piece of paper.

To build this skill up, you should first break it down. Underneath your chosen skill, write out the smaller skills and actions you need to get better at. If you wrote down charisma, you could break it down into things like active listening, smiling, using their names, using tone of voice well, and so on.

Getting stuck?

Ask ChatGPT to break it down into behaviors and actions. ;)

You will now have a blueprint for growth!

After you have broken down your skill into smaller bits, you can build your skill through practicing in isolation. If you tried to learn the entire list of skills at once, you’re doomed to fail! Instead, pick one and practice that first, then move on to the next behavior.

Tip: Try to identify your bottleneck, fixing that will give you the fastest growth.

Cheers,
Maikel

Ps. Do you struggle with confidence, and want to build yours? Check out this free masterclass. I break down the entire formula for building confidence.