&gt; make significant progress towards competency in a new skill by putting in a MODICUM of time, effort and attention.<p>But even that is not always true.  There are some activities where it&#x27;s hard to see meaningful progress for awhile, but then once you&#x27;ve built up an adequate base you start progressing more rapidly.<p>These kinds of articles tend to be popular because they make people think that it&#x27;s easy to learn new things.  This is an inspiring idea and if it results in people learning more things then it might even be a beneficial thing to say.  But I think it&#x27;s more beneficial to promote the value of deliberate focused effort (hard work if you will), because some things simply don&#x27;t come easily.