The Parable of the Pottery Class
One question I get asked a lot by budding content creators is if they should focus more on the quantity or the quality of their content.
I recently came across a story which answers this question perfectly (the lessons from this story apply to multiple scenarios, not just content creation). It’s called the Parable of the Pottery Class and here’s how it goes:
There was once a ceramics teacher called Brian. One month, Brian decided to split his class into two groups. Group A had to make a pot every day for 30 days (so 30 pots in total) and would be judged on the quantity. Group B had to work on a single pot for the whole 30 days and would be judged on the quality of the pot, so it had to be the most perfect pot.
At the end of the month, Brian judged the quality of the pots. Without exception, every one of the top 10 pots came from Group A, those that made one pot per day. None came from the group that focused on perfecting their single pot.
Quantity always trumps quality. This sounds almost counterintuitive because we often assume that if we have more time, we can make our work better, but the easiest and quickest way to level up our skills is by focusing on quantity - being consistent and sticking to a schedule will automatically help you improve in whatever it is you’re trying to work on.
I’m sure we’ve all faced the ‘starting problem’ at some point or the other where we really want to do something but don’t start because we worry we won’t do a good job of it. Although it seems obvious that to get good at something, you’ll likely make mistakes along the way, it’s still scary to embrace failure as a part of your growth process.
So here’s what I told myself when I was starting to make videos (and I recommend you to try this as well): ‘Look, I know my first 50 videos (replace videos with whatever suits your purpose) are going to suck, but that’s okay. I want to create amazing videos over time, but to get there, I need to start somewhere’.
This shift in attitude has been a total game changer for me. From being someone who was paralysed by her perfection, I’ve trained myself to stop overthinking and just start doing things, and I think this has been one of the best things I’ve done for myself.
Like I said in one of my previous emails to you, done is better than perfect. :)