When I was young, I heard my parents always say that as long as you are proficient in a craft, you will be able to eat for the rest of your life; and then our teachers told us that we should be well-read and multi-talented to be a well-rounded child.
So is it better to be a specialist in one area, or to be good at all areas and be a generalist?
The book Growing Up Boundaries tells us the answer. The author of this book, David Epstein, is a New York Times No.1 bestselling author. He researched the real cases of the world's first-class success stories in various fields, and found an interesting phenomenon: "generalists" have more possibilities of success than "specialists", and exploring across the range of competencies will be the key to the future battle of the diversified era.
This book tells us that generalists have more opportunities than specialists to broaden their knowledge and develop themselves in multiple fields, and to find a path that suits them. If you don't have any limitations in your life, you will be able to realize your future.
01. Do children who win at the starting line have to run to the finish line first?
Children need to win at the starting line, this is a widely circulated parenting sentence, is how many parents on the child's ardent hope.
Parents plan their children's lives too early.
The media has reported the story of a "child prodigy": a mother in Wuhan, in order to prevent her child from losing at the starting line, spent 120,000 yuan in five years to enroll her child in a training course, and the child finished the second year of elementary school at the age of five. The child on the first grade performance is very good, but in the second grade, Jie's performance began to decline, from the class of the top students into the middle students, gradually, he began to anorexia, class distraction. Less than the third grade, it died out.
The Boundaries of Growth tells us that winning at the starting line is not the same as running to the finish line first. Anything is possible.
These children initially excel under the guidance of specialized teachers. But in the long run, there was an early bottleneck, and later results were not very good.
So, the so-called "win at the starting line" may be short-lived. As the saying goes, ten years of trees, a hundred years of trees. Life is not a 100-meter dash, but a marathon. The children who win at the starting line are not necessarily the first to run to the finish line.
What you need to teach your child is not the closed skills of a temporary leader, but the open advantages of a lifetime. Your child should be exposed to a wider range of learning, from which he or she will go farther if they find what they do best.
02. Broaden the breadth of knowledge to find the best match
There is a saying that the bigger the island of knowledge, the longer the line of the ocean of curiosity.
Broaden the breadth of knowledge, find your best match options, and go deeper in erudition will go farther.
"Xidan girl" Ren Yue Li was singing on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala and became famous. After that, walking in various regions for commercial performances.
She realized her dream of being a singer, but it didn't stop her from realizing her dream of becoming an entrepreneur. With the aura of a singer, she polished herself in a wide range of knowledge and opened herself to new avenues, starting her own toothpaste business, which is now worth more than a billion dollars, and standing in the square of the New York Times with the image of a businesswoman.
The same is the field of music wizards Hua Chenyu, he is not only songs by everyone's favorite, but also a composer, lyricist. At the same time, many musicians like him usually master multiple instruments rather than specializing in 1.
The talent is not just a job in itself, like Andy Lau, who is a singer, songwriter, actor, and producer across music and film.
Everyone is unique, so it's important to read a lot, broaden your knowledge, and find the best match for your field. There are no limits to growth, so that you can achieve your goals in life.
03. Growth without boundaries, the future can be expected
Tolstoy wrote in "War and Peace": "His eyes are always on the whole estate, rather than a sector of the estate ...... so Nicolas' agricultural operations also achieved the most brilliant achievements."
It is not at all enough for a person to refine the content of their goals to achieve them.
Simply put, if you want to achieve proficiency in an English major, not only do you need to use English listening, speaking, reading, writing, and translating freely, but you also need to learn the underlying cultural knowledge and cultural literacy, including Western literature and cultural knowledge. Only with this knowledge as a foundation can you truly internalize English.
A simple subject requires a broadening of knowledge in order to become proficient in a specialty. Not to mention the breadth of knowledge required to become a specialist in a field.
Darwin's great theory of biological evolution could not be separated from his quest to expound the breadth of knowledge. His theory on the development of anthropology, psychology, philosophy can not be ignored.
Steve Jobs, the "Father of Apple", also said that the beautiful fonts of Apple computers were made possible by the calligraphy classes he took in college.
Zhang Meng, the bestselling author, is often asked, "You're an expert in time management, but you know a lot about branding, business models, and nutritional theories. Zhang Meng founded the Off-Duty Fuel Station to broaden her knowledge by consulting and learning from big names in various fields.
I've heard the saying that a person who has 18 skills and is good at everything is a generalist. Accumulating experience in different fields not only effectively improves your creativity, but each field of knowledge you learn will serve you in choosing the most compatible field.
In an era of rapid change, what is more important than deliberate practice is deliberate experimentation, which enables you to generalize and build up a thick layer of knowledge. Crossing boundaries is for better lifelong growth. There are no boundaries for growth, and the future is only promising.
In conclusion:
The Boundaries of Growth is a book that spans the fields of sports, education, music, astronomy, and art and medicine, and cites a large number of celebrity cases to provide an in-depth analysis of how generalists can better adapt to the pace of society's constant development.
It's hard to replace a generalist with a specialist, and specializing in a particular field will allow you to achieve excellent results.
A specialist can hardly replace a generalist, and specializing in a particular field can help you achieve excellent results.
We need to forge ourselves into a multi-functional Swiss army knife, and expand the scope of our capabilities by crossing borders - no more boundaries for growth, no more possibilities for the future.