fbpx
Menu

Passion Without Talent

HomeForumsPurposePassion Without Talent

New Reply
Viewing 3 posts - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #69537

    I have been working toward a dream, with a mentor, and it has become clear that I have zero talent.

    Thoughts? I googled “Passion without talent” and everybody is saying I should give up. What if I can’t? Is there hope?

    • This topic was modified 9 years, 2 months ago by tinybuddha.
    #69538
    June Morrow
    Participant

    Bethany, you should definitely keep going. Here’s why: passion is what drives mastery, not talent. Here’s a story to illustrate.

    Years ago I used to do stand-up comedy. At the time I would perform at open mics with other several comics who were horrible. They couldn’t make a jackal laugh if they were tried. They were new to the business and, yet, wanted nothing more than to be a professional comedian. Maybe one joke out of their entire sets worked. It was painful to watch and watching them you would have sworn they had no talent.

    But they did not give up. Flash forward ten years later and these same comics have had their own television specials, tour nationally, have opened for household names, and even appear on sit coms. To newcomers, who nine times out of ten, suck at comedy just as bad as they do, they are heroes to emulate. No one would ever suspect how bad they were at the craft in the beginning. You would look at them and think – they are so talented!

    But they earned that talent. And I know at least one of them suspected he had no talent. He wanted to move back home because he simply wasn’t getting anywhere. I talked him out of it. The next year he got signed to an agency and the following year taped a one hour special.

    If you have a dream work to make it happen. By working toward it, you will develop the skills you need. Big dreams call on us to learn big skills and overcome big challenges. But we are never given anything more than we can handle. There is always a way.

    You are just going to have to learn by doing, and perhaps failing, and learning from it and getting up and doing again. To do that is real talent, Bethany. Use your passion to drive you and get over the hurdles in your way.

    Keep at it. You owe it to your dreams to make it happen. Lots of people who others might consider “talentless” have gone far in this world. It’s just a matter of ignoring that inner voice that says you can’t and do it anyway.

    Hope that helps.

    • This reply was modified 9 years, 3 months ago by June Morrow.
    #72061
    Mike
    Participant

    To “make it” in anything passion is the number 1 ingredient. They say to master or be a professional in any skill requires 10,000 hours of practice. Sure if you have natural talent it helps, but it takes passion in order to practice and work hard. What is exactly is talent anyway, the brain is pretty good at picking up new skills when practiced. Basically talent is just saying that a person is predisposed to be good at certain types of activities. A person who plays piano can have talent, but what is exactly is that talent? It is the ability to make music on a piano, the person is able good at multitasking, has good cordination, can hear the sounds that make up music. This person could have done a number of different things that involved those same functions. Many people who are “professionals” in a field admit that they have no natural talent that they just work hard. It is always a blend of things. Sports usually require athleticism and ability in that sport. Can a person really have natural talent to put a ball through a hoop? No they have good depth perception and able to shoot the ball the exact same way consistently. There are people with very little athleticism that can put the ball through the hoop as well as any professional basketball player yet don’t have the other same attributes that would make them a “talented” basketball player. There are some really talented people who blow it. All in all you are doing it right, you have a mentor if you work hard and put in the hours talent is a non factor.

Viewing 3 posts - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Please log in OR register.