A Star is Made: Where does talent really come from?
Reviewing a new 900-page academic book The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance that will be published this month, Freakonomics authors report some very interesting findings.
(I highly recommend you read this piece if you have an interest in finding out how a star is made in any discipline.)
Here are three conclusions from this massive work:
1. The trait we call talent is highly overrated.
That is, expert performers – whether in memory or surgery, ballet or computer programming – are nearly always made, not born. And yes,
2. Practice does make perfect. And last, my personal favorite:
3. When it comes to choosing a life path, you should do what you love – because if you don’t love it, you are unlikely to work hard enough to get very good.
They add, “Most people naturally don’t like to do things they aren’t ‘good’ at. So they often give up, telling themselves they simply don’t possess the talent for math or skiing or the violin.”
But the truth is this:
“What they really lack is the desire to be good and to undertake the deliberate practice that would make them better.
Joseph Campbell was right when he told his students, “Follow your bliss.”
And yes, especially in your work. If you don’t love your product, for example, chances are you won’t do the deliberate practice it takes to learn how to talk about it so that you get good at it.
If you don’t love SOMETHING about your network marketing business enough to spend the time to learn to do it well, your chances of succeeding are slim to none.
So ask yourself, what do you LOVE MADLY about what you’re doing? Is it making a difference in someone’s life? Is it what the income can buy?
Whatever turns you on, will keep you going.
And if it’s nothing special, perhaps this business really isn’t the best thing for you to be doing. Why NOT love what you do? People can tell if you don’t.
One thing’s for sure in our business: The promise of income is NOT enough. Not for the 95% who drop out, that is.
So what else is there that you love enough or are challenged by enough, to keep you practicing deliberately and systematically as everyone has ever done who excels in something?
