The Importance of Apprenticeship
“Mastery” by Robert Greene. Part 2: Submit to Reality: The Ideal Apprenticeship
“We receive three educations, one from our parents, one from our school masters, and one from the world. The third contradicts all that the first two teach us.”
—Baron De Montesquieu
Apprenticeship is an essential and critical piece on the journey to mastery. In Mastery Robert Greene chronicles the apprenticeships of masters, past and present. Da Vinci, Mozart, Darwin, Einstein, The Beatles, and many others, all had an extensive period of apprenticing, before they revolutionized their given fields.
This is a fundamental part of the development of all masters. But is often overlooked or not fully appreciated by most people when considering the pursuit of their calling.
We see the end result of these titans. Respected by all most everyone. On top of the mountain. We assume they were born with god-like abilities. That they were geniuses from the moment they began studying and engaging in their vocation. This is the exact misconception which Greene dispels in Mastery.
The thesis of his book is that mastery is not for the exceptionally talented or lucky, but a life-long process which anyone can choose to follow. By studying masters in a wide variety of fields, we can see there is a system which they all followed.
This system begins with accepting the existence of your Life’s Task (we covered this in last week’s newsletter, see Discovering Your Calling, in the notes). The next step in the system is to “Submit to Reality”, and engage in “The Ideal Apprenticeship.” This is what we will be discussing today.
The Importance of Apprenticeship
Apprenticeship is an ancient practice. Dating back to the beginnings of civilization. Young people would dedicate many of their early years training under a master in a given skill.
Blacksmiths, stoneworkers, carpenters, warriors, and many other essential workers would train under masteries for years, sometimes decades, before being given the responsibility of doing the work on their own. Onces someone reached true proficiency in their skill, they were entrusted with their own apprentices to train.
It is fair to say that the civilization we live in today would not exist with out this long tradition of master and apprentice. The Ancient Egyptians monumental structures, the Great Pyramids, would not exist without the master-apprentice relationship to maintain construction over decades. Nor, work most of the structures you see in your city or town today.
As civilization evolved, apprenticeship was extended beyond physical work to more artistic and intellectual work as well. Artists, scientists, engineers, writers, chefs, even philosophers, all engaged in formal or informal master-apprentice relationships.
Because of this long history, many people today think of apprenticeship as an antiquated or outdated system. As a way to get cheap, or even free, labor out of young people. While this may have been the case for many, this doesn’t mean that we should dismiss this practice so easily.
We can confidently say modern society would not exist as it does without the apprentice-master relationship. The very purpose of this system is for the wiser and more experienced master to save the student time. To learn from their mistakes and shortcomings.
As the saying goes, “Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it.” A proper apprenticeship will introduce one to the history of their field. They will learn about the great minds which revolutionized the field. As well as, cautionary tales of those who allowed ego or malice to blink them to the highest good of their industry or tradition.
The apprentice’s job is to absorb the knowledge of mastery, and evolve the practice to its next stage of development. To further the tradition in a positive way. As Da Vinci put it, “Poor is the pupil who does not surpass their master.”
It is not enough to become a charbo-copy of your mastery. It is the apprentices duty to further the tradition. To deeply understand and respect their ancestors, while putting their unique touch on the field. In this way, one feels a part of something much bigger than themselves, while adding to this something bigger in a meaningful way that transcends their own lifetime.
Apprenticeship Today
Formal apprenticeships still exist to this day. Particularly in the trades: Plumbing, carpentry, electrical work, and operating heavy equipment, to name a few. There is a set amount of time, often several years, in which an apprentice works under a journeyman (someone who has already served a full apprenticeship). During this time the apprentice often does class room study and lab work, as well as hand on field work, under the supervision of a journeyman.
There are many more cases of informal-apprenticeships. One’s in which someone begins the journey into the unknown, and learns from a mastery they can find. These master-student relationships my exist over long distances. Consisting of phone call, or emails.
In many cases, the student may not personally know the master, but be learning from their work through books and videos. This can open the world of available masters to learn from because they don’t even have to be alive. So many masters have left entire apprenticeships worth of knowledge and wisdom in books.
My Personal Lessons From Apprenticeship
I have served two of these traditional apprenticeships in my life, each lasting about three years, in the field of electrical work. Having said this, for the last twelve years I’ve spent most of my adult life either as an apprentice or as a journeyman training apprentices. I find that the system, while not perfect, has so much to offer a generation of people struggling to find their passion, meaning, and work to connect them to something bigger than themselves.
In the case of both apprenticeships, I started out completely intimidated and mystified by the field. I couldn’t possibly imagine being on the other side of the seemingly impossibly large gap between where I was and where I thought I would be as a journeyman. But both times I pulled it off. I learned something about patience and consistency, which you can only know from years of dedicated work.
Because of this, it hit me, a little over a year ago, that with enough dedicated time and effort, I could serve an apprenticeship which alines with my calling. With my Life’s Task. This is why I dedicated myself to writing this past year.
While I am not serving a formal apprenticeship in writing, as I have in electrical work, the spirit is the same. Find the masters. Learn from them. And most importantly: sit your ass down everyday and write.
Know this is a many year long journey. Maybe many decades. If I’m lucky, a lifetime.
As Robert Greene says “Submit to Reality.” This means not to think, imagine, or strategies about how to approach a vocation. But submit to it. Give it an important peice of your life for many years. Find a master, or a multited of masterys, who are willing to trasmit their wisdom. Accept that you will not be proficient for many years, and the only way to the other side is though.
This very newsletter is my attempt to submit to reality. I spent over a decade thinking “I should start writing a book.” I started many times, but never lasted more than a few days.
Finally, I decided that I need the social accountability of others. I started sending emails out to people, found Substack, and now I’ve published over 60 articles. This is still the early days of this apperticeship. I am getting my reps in. But I’ve already decided I’m in this for the long haul.
As I often say, I am honered that all of you are along for the journey as well. I hope it serves to inspire others to find their calling. Their Life’s Task. And to Submit to Reality and dedicate themselves to their apprenticeship.
Notes: