Become an Expert

I stumbled across a video about six months ago… Australian dude, driving in his car, talking to his phone about sales people ‘cold calling’ and why it doesn’t work. I forget why watched it, something to do with work, maybe? I think the only reason I watched all the way through was because of his accent… Anyway, at the very end of the video he said something, one of those ideas that are so simple and yet so true that they stick with you like peanut butter on the roof of your mouth.

Become an expert; publish what you know.

“Become an expert and publish everything you know about what you do.” For him, it meant, don’t call them, make them call you, but for me, it means something a bit grander than that. It made me think about all the things I know and how I’m not an expert at anything.

So I started thinking about all my interests, and why I find them interesting, why I never push myself up and over that learning curve I talked about yesterday, and which one of those interests would be worthy of my full attention. I thought about money and time and my job and my lifestyle and my fears and my dreams… I made lists… lots and lots of lists.

In the end, it seemed there was really only one thing to focus on: Video Game Development.

I know, video games seem foreign to many of the people who read this blog, but if you’ll stick with me over the next couple of posts, you’ll see how the skills a person must acquire to build a video game, or any interactive experience are useful in every part of our culture today, and will become even more so in the future.

Because what is video game development, at its core? It’s interactive storytelling made with art and code.  That’s all.  It is, in a way, just like this blog. I type these words onto this screen, ideas are converted into pixels with code which in turn enable you to read my thoughts. It’s a virtual conversation with code as the medium.  It’s the way more and more of us interact with each other everyday.

So. That is what I’m going to do with my 2017. I’m going to become an expert in video game development. In one year. (You should be laughing now.)

to be continued…