Mastery
by Jonathan Gehrz | April 14, 2011
Fellow doctoral colleagues:
This will be one of my shortest posts to date, but I hope the depth of the subject matter is not lost in the simplicity of the post. Earlier this morning, a friend presented me with the gift of Daniel Pink’s Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. While I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, I was immediately drawn to the chapter on Mastery. Pink writes,
The opposite of autonomy is control. And since they sit at different poles of the behavioral compass, they point us toward different destinations. Control leads to compliance; autonomy leads to engagement. And this distinction leads to the second element of Type 1 behavior: mastery – the desire to get better and better at something that matters (pp. 110-111).
As you think about your doctoral journey, (for many, the epitome of academic mastery) have you recently stopped and asked yourself the following:
Am I autonomous?
Am I engaged?
Do I desire to be better?
Am I doing something that matters?
Does your mastery serve a greater purpose?