I had an interesting discussion yesterday with a fellow coach. We were exploring the idea of learning versus practice. We sometimes use the terms interchangeably, but do they mean the same thing?

If you decide to learn a new skill, it might take while to learn basic techniques. You might call the time you spend practice, but your focus is learning. Almost everything you try is new, so there is little hope of achieving consistency.

It’s not practice until you get it right.

Practice is reinforcing what you are doing so you can do it consistently. The potential risk is that if you practice doing something poorly, you get really good at doing it poorly.

Practice makes habit, so get it right.

Deliberate practice combines learning and practice. Learn techniques well enough to achieve consistency, then find ways to do it better. Instead of a focus on consistency, focus on continuous improvement.

We don’t rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training.
– Archilochos

Where do you use learning, practice and deliberate practice?