Aggressive Certainty

I'm re-reading "Mastery" right now because I feel like I'm not progressing as steadily as I should, and I'm having trouble keeping up with the goals I'm setting for myself.  It culminated last night in a bad dream in which I was on the forums reading something by Grindcore, when suddenly I was struck by the sickening realization that I had no idea what he was talking about while everybody else was nodding in agreement and going on to the next subject. I woke up this morning disoriented and frightened as a result.  Tetris nightmares, ftw!? Consequently, those old feelings of inadequacy and inferiority are rising up again.  But just now, after reading the following passage, I realized I never truly understood this book the first time through.  It's in a strange, new (yet old) language, diametrically opposed to the "go-go-go,"  "Type A personality" advice we've been hearing so far.

An excerpt from Mastery: The Keys to Success and Long-Term Fulfillment by George Leonard:

The Joy of Regular Practice

   At that time, the aikido school I attended was only eighteen months old, and 
there were no regular students above blue belt. Our teachers, the only black
belts around, seemed to exist in an entirely different plane from the one on
which we moved. I never even considered the possibility that I would rise to
that rarefied plane. So there I was—an impatient, rather driven person who had
always gone for the quickest, most direct route to a given goal—practicing
regularly and hard for no particular goal at all, just for its own sake. Months
would pass with no break in the steady rhythm of my practice. It was something
new in my life, a revelation. The endless succession of classes was rewarding
precisely because it was, in the Zen sense, "nothing special."
   I went to class three or four times a week, from seven to nine P.M. When it 
was time to drive to the dojo (practice hall) in the city, the problems and
distractions of the day began falling away. Just folding the quilted white
cotton gi practice uniform softened my breathing and brought me a feeling of
peace. The drive took about a half hour, across the bridge into the city, over
a long hill that taxed my car's lowest gear, then finally down to a broad and
noisy avenue noted for row upon row of car dealerships. Despite the noise
outside, climbing the stairs to the second-story dojo was like entering a
sanctuary, a place both alien to my customary existence and altogether
familiar.
   I loved everything about it, the ritual that was always the same yet always 
new: bowing upon entering, pulling my membership card from the rack on the
front desk, changing to my gi in the dressing room. I loved the comforting
smell of sweat, the subdued talk. I loved coming out of the dressing room and
checking to see which other students were already warming up. I loved bowing
again as I stepped on the mat, feeling the cool firm surface on the soles of
my feet. I loved taking my place in the long row of aikidoists all sitting in
seiza, the Japanese meditation position. I loved the entry of our teacher, the
ritual bows, the warm-up techniques, and then my heart pounding, my breath
rushing as the training increased in speed and power.
   It wasn't always like that. Sometimes, when the moment came to go to class, 
I would be feeling particularly lazy. On those occasions I would be tempted to
do almost anything rather than face myself once again on the mat. And sometimes
I would give in to that inevitable human resistance against doing what's best
for us, and waste an evening distracting myself. I knew quite well, however,
that when I did overcome my lethargy, I would be rewarded with a little miracle:
I knew that, no matter how I felt on climbing the dojo stairs, two hours later—
after hundreds of throws and falls—I would walk out tingling and fully alive,
feeling so good, in fact, that the night itself would seem to sparkle and gleam.
   This joy, I repeat, had little to do with progress or the achievement of 
goals. I was taken totally by surprise, in fact, when one of my teachers called
a fellow student and me into his office after a weekend of marathon training
and handed us brown belts, the rank next to black belt. One night about a year
later, the four most advanced brown belts in the school happened to have a
conversation during which we obliquely touched upon the possibility that we
ourselves might someday achieve the rank of black belt. The idea was both
exciting and troubling, and when I next came to class I was aware of something
new: the worm of ambition was eating stealthily away at the center of my belly.
   Maybe it was coincidence, but within three weeks of that conversation all 
four of us suffered serious injuries—a broken toe, torn ligaments in the elbow,
a dislocated shoulder (mine), and an arm broken in three places. These injuries
were effective teachers. After recovering, we settled back into steady, goal-
less practice. Another year and a half was to pass before the four of us made
black belt.

Full text at: http://free.yudu.com/item/details/53403/Mastery---The-Keys-To-Success-And-Long-Term-Fulfillment---George-Leonard.pdf