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Comment by jamesbkel | Hacker News Reader

I agree with the overall point here, but isn't this just the same as saying "practice" and/or "keep practicing, especially with those that are better than you"?

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A band director in middle school once said something that stuck with me to this day. "Practice doesn't make perfect - practice makes permanent."

If you keep practicing the wrong way, you'll never improve.

That must be a favorite band director phrase. My director in high school always said it as "Practice doesn't make perfect - perfect practice makes perfect."

I see this more as an alternative way of saying "master the basics".

I can't count the number of times that I've seen developers (or classmates) try really complex things without understanding what's going on underneath, and then not be able to understand why it doesn't work.

Completely agree. One of the main things I learned in my 20 or so years of classical piano playing was to focus on basics. In my haste I think I missed that thrust of the OP and also neglected to mention it in my response.

Yes and no, the point is to practice smart. Not everything has equal pedagogical value and learning difficult techniques is worthless if you can't avoid idiocy.

To me, it seems closer to "be mindful" or "be deliberate". You can keep practicing with those better than you, but if you don't know what you're doing wrong, or how to fix it, you won't get better.

You have to know what you're doing wrong, so you can stop doing it.

Not quite. The point is that you can often get the most improvement by focusing your effort on eliminating really stupid mistakes.

Mindful practice.

This. You want to be consciously practicing things that are hard. Once you find yourself getting comfortable, get uncomfortable.

Agreed, should have specified that in my response.

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