How do you become a master (according to someone who is)

One of the best chess blogs currently active is the simply-titled "dana blogs chess" (also linked in the sidebar).  Probably the most succinct and useful summation (that I've seen) of what it takes to become a chess master is contained in his recent "How Do You Become A Life Master?" post.  He draws on an experience of being interviewed to further contemplate the question, with excellent results (and comments).

I'll let you read all of the specific chess observations via the original linked post above, but here's an excerpted general observation which I think is also very relevant for any improving player (or person...)

The question was, “If you could talk with your 20-year-old self, what would you say to them?”

I had two pieces of advice for my 20-year-old self. The first was: Don’t be afraid of failure. Before I was 20, all I did was succeed, succeed, succeed. (Except at things like sports, where I failed early and often. However, it is socially acceptable for a nerd to be bad at sports.) But three of my most formative experiences, the things that taught me humility and forced me to figure out what I wanted to do with my life, were failures.