Between Knowing and Questioning

Mastery: Between Knowing and Questioning

Mastery is a word we often throw around as if it were a fixed destination, something one arrives at after a long enough journey. Train for two years, and you improve. Train for thirty, and surely, you have mastered your craft. But is that really how it works?

The idea that mastery is purely the result of time and repetition is comforting—it suggests a clear path, a formula. Yet, if that were entirely true, every long-time practitioner of an art form would be a master. And we know that’s not the case.

There is something else at play, something that doesn’t fit neatly into a linear progression. True mastery lives in the space between knowing and questioning, between order and chaos. It’s not just about acquiring more skills but about the ability to move freely between structure and intuition, between discipline and play.

The musician who clings too tightly to precision may lose the ability to take risks, to breathe life into the notes. The one who abandons all structure may lose the depth that comes from understanding form. Mastery, then, is not a rigid state but a dance—a constant negotiation between what we know and what we are willing to question.

This is where transformation happens. Not just in accumulating knowledge, but in learning how to let go of it at the right moment, allowing something unexpected, something alive, to emerge.

So perhaps mastery is not an endpoint but a way of being. A way of moving through the world—curious, disciplined, willing to step into the unknown. Because that’s where the real magic happens.

Few musicians exemplify this definition of mastery as Bill Evans does. His playing balanced precise technique with fluid, introspective phrasing, always navigating between control and freedom. Today, at the top of my Piano Peace playlist, I´ve added his beautiful improvisation: Peace Piece. Listen to it here.

Enjoy, and have a great day,

Claudio.