Genius is an immense capacity for taking trouble.

What looks like exceptional ability is usually an exceptional willingness to take pains. Going back over the thing again, checking what nobody would check, throwing out a version that was nearly good enough: that is unglamorous, invisible from outside, and it accounts for most of the gap between fine work and remarkable work. The talent is largely the appetite for the trouble.

Take one piece of work this week and give it the pass you would normally skip. Read it aloud, check the number you assumed was right, redo the part you know is weak. That single extra round is available to everybody and almost nobody spends it.