Jack of all trades

The cliché of “Jack of all trades, master of none” is used often to heap ridicule on others without any specific field of specialisation, as though a single professional qualification stands better than its alternative.

Oh, wait, hold on… try keying in the phrase on wikipedia.org and hey, presto! Up comes another story that’s quite the opposite.

Here’s what it says: “The full quote "Jack of all trades, master of none, though ofttimes better than master of one." is actually a compliment”.

It further describes such “Jack of all trades” being what’s called Renaissance or Polymath people to the likes of Da Vinci, Copernicus, Newton and Goethe, amongst many. You know, people with multi-specialisations. Yes, you’ve heard right – MULTI-SPECIALISATIONS. These people mentioned are scientists, authors, musicians as well a s a host of other specialisations, all rolled into each one.

See, whoever presumes that one specific specialisation is necessary for everyone has severely underestimated the full capability and potential of humanity.

The human body, mind and spirit is able to expand far more than what we’re been seeing these days. Ultra-marathoners are pushing more than two times the distance of traditional marathon runs and athletes are pushing numbers and boundaries as never before thought possible. Tibetan monks are able to break into sweat in the middle of the Himalayan mountains in minus freezing temperatures wearing nothing more than thin loincloths, and the list goes on and on…

I wouldn’t be surprised if we’ll be splitting nothing into two halves of nothingness given that we’ve already gone way past splitting atoms back in 1932.

Hence, perhaps it’s time to stop playing the broken record of how one field of specialisation defines a person and move into the real world of change and evolution in humankind that is setting new standards of excellence beyond that which has been preached by our forefathers.

It’s time to multi-specialise. Why? Hmm… simply because we’re able to?