I’m not a fan of the 10, 000 hour theory: The idea that you’ll achieve mastery of something once you’ve put in 10,000 hours of practice.

It sounds like it should make sense, but it collapses once you take a closer look at it. The only reason it’s a popular saying is because it gets repeated often as the subject of motivational posters, memes and speakers that don’t think it through.

Here’s why I don’t trust the 10,000 hour theory – or a surgeon who says it.

Let’s Break It Down…

When you take 10,000 hours and divide it by 24, the answer is 416.667. Divide 10,000 by 12 and the answer is 833.333.

Both are terrifying in the context of most skills and talents, don’t you think?

The first thing I imagine is the theoretical possibility of having to go in for surgery and being introduced to the doctor. “He’s fully qualified,” says the nurse. “He’s had 10,000 hours of heart surgery before.”

That’s the point where I’d pull out my own IV, get up out of the hospital bed and leave.

(For the record, I have, and it’s not recommended to pull out any needles quickly: The resulting spurt from the vein is spectacular and worth mentioning as a caution to anyone leaving a hospital room in haste.)

There’s no possible context in which 10,000 hours qualifies you to master anything. Certainly not surgery, and certainly not bridge.

The moment you believe that you’ve mastered something completely, it’s the opposite. Instead, it shows you have a lot to learn – pride-before-the-fall and all of that.

If you want to be better at something (or master anything), you have to stretch your learning experience over the course of an entire lifetime above imagining that 10,000 hours is nearly enough.

Have you ever realized the trap of the supposed 10,000 hour theory?