I deeply enjoyed Robert Greene’s The 48 Laws of Power. It’s not like he’s saying anything new, but something about his writing style appeals strongly to me- I get the sense that we’d geek out about the same things. I can imagine him growing up reading the same stories, falling in love with the same myths and perhaps even playing the same video games.

So when I found out that he had a new book called Mastery, and it was about evaluating the success principles and strategies of effective individuals, I had to pounce on it. His style simply appeals to me too much. I decided I was going to apply whatever he suggested- not because there’s anything special about what he’s saying, but because I find his voice remarkably persuasive. Your mileage may vary.

1: Find your Life’s Task.

What am I best at? What do I have an intense feeling about? I think I’m best at working with words. I’m best at playing around with ideas. I’m not that good at coming up with original ones- I don’t even really know what original means, to be honest. I think I’m good at taking other people’s ideas, combining them and then presenting them in a fun way. I think I’m pretty good at figuring out what works or what doesn’t when it comes to the presentation of ideas- whether we’re talking about music, art, movies, books or TED Talks. Now, I’m not the best presenter out there. I don’t have the skill-set I need to even pretend that I have anything meaningful to contribute in any one of these fields. But if something had to be my Life’s Task, I imagine this would be it.

I have always felt a sense of affinity with writers like Voltaire, Benjamin Franklin, Francis Bacon and Michel Montaigne that I’m typically embarrassed to talk about, because anybody who claims to do so seems like a right loony. But I do, and I feel that I am ready to stop pretending that I don’t.

2: Find a niche where you can dominate.

The first niche that comes to mind is a particular space in Singaporean public discourse. There are lots of voices in the fray, but I feel that they tend to fall into two broad categories- the “academic” and the “popular”. (Both are very poor terms to use, but they’ll have to suffice until I can think of better ones.) The former: Huge walls of insight that are impenetrable to the layperson. The latter: cheap shots and incendiary link-bait.

3: Rebel against the wrong path, and use that anger as motivation.

This immediately makes me think about University.

Yes, I do suffer from a case of sour grapes. If I had a scholarship, or perhaps performed better in JC, I would have most definitely chosen to go to University, just as I would have gone to RI instead of VS if I had the necessary PSLE score. I will concede this as gracefully as I can. I have developed an “anti-University” stance primarily because of my status and position. I might have never done so otherwise. Yes.

But think about it- now that I’m in this position, what can I learn from it? Where is the control group when testing the hypothesis “University is a good idea”? You can’t just compare University students against people who would never have had a chance to end up there- that’s not a fair experiment. We need to compare people who spend $$ to go to university for a few years against people who could have gone, but didn’t (either by choice or happenstance)

My theory is that personal excellence is what matters, not the path you take. I find the idea of doing well outside of university to be far more exciting than doing well within it. Yes, this is influenced by the fact that I didn’t get any of the courses I was interested in.

4: Love your subject at a very basic level.

I do. This is why I blog, this is why I ended up becoming a Quora Top Writer 2012. I can spend hours arguing on the internet because I love it. I love discussion, I love conversation, I love evaluating the presentation of ideas, and I honestly don’t think I’ve ever encountered anybody else who loves it quite the way I do. (Emphasis on “the way I do”, not “as much as I do”!)

I do.