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Talent

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Re: Talent

#71

Post by _glass »

kaladin-jasnah wrote: post #4

The author concludes that "I should make sure I sweated blood working on a strength, [and] do more of what comes naturally." Something I found was that sometimes the things I have the most passion and interest for are _not_ the things that are strengths. But they have become strengths. Today, I would consider myself to be an OS and systems programmer person. It was abjectly _not_ something that came to me naturally.…

Yes, this is so true for me. Especially when I had this revenge arc, where I knew I could be good. Most of my strengths came later. Now people think that I am talented in that stuff, but there's always hard work behind it, and I was mostly the worst in class. But there was always a shining light in sight, where I knew I could, and that it is a good pathway.

Re: Talent

#72

Post by popcorncowboy »

codersfocus wrote: post #58
babblingfish wrote: post #3

This reminds me of Oliver Burkeman's insight in "Meditations for Mortals" that we can only control quantity, not quality. He suggests we focus on what's within our control: showing up consistently and doing the work, rather than obsessing over outcomes. Another piece of his advice is to choose pursuits where you have a natural aptitude. Otherwise, there's too much friction. People enjoy being competent. Haruki Muraka…

People absolutely can control quality. A simple example is handwriting, I can write chicken scratch or something neater if I slow down. Working longer on many creative pursuits will improve the quality, by experimenting with ideas.

Only up to their quality limit though. This is a slightly different concept to a quantity limit (which also exists), but the general (imperfect) idea is that for your "quality level" (i.e. your ability ceiling), the only real knob you can dial is quantity. In practice, quantity seems to be a defining factor for pushing your ability ceiling higher.

Re: Talent

#73

Post by Animats »

ItsHarper wrote: post #61
Animats wrote: post #60

I've known some people with serious artistic talent. Even if they didn't like it. It seems to be inherited. A friend who was a good graphics artist (drawings in Smithsonian) has a son and a daughter. The daughter can draw well, but doesn't use the skill much. The son grew up drawing cars, and now he draws car designs for a major car company. For both of them, it wasn't all that hard. One unusual skill is the military…

I wonder how much of it is inheritance, and how much of it is the parent giving their child lots of opportunity to explore their interest with them

It surprised the mother that her kids had artistic talent. She put no effort into teaching them art skills. She wasn't doing it professionally any more, being somewhat burned out by all that fine detail work. They got into art by themselves.

Re: Talent

#74

Post by kaladin-jasnah »

sjamaan wrote: post #66
kaladin-jasnah wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also think it's not super easy to evaluate whether you have an innate talent for something. The example of Ramanujan reading math textbooks when he was twelve is definitely an exceptional case, but I also think it's not clear to a lot of twelve year olds that such deep resources in a subject even exist. I was lucky that my county's library system had a literal treasure trove of computer science related books that I…

> If your parents present you with your first computer when you're five years old, and it drops you to a bash prompt, and that's all you have, then you'll probably know considerably more than everyone else just from that being your only choice for a computing environment. Only if you have the interest and aptitude to dig in. Compare this with OP's story about trying to learn music instruments at an early age, and his…

Yeah. I think it's about exposure, though. You can find your interests, talents, and such more easily if you have the luck to have the smörgåsbord of cool things in life presented to you at a young age.

Re: Talent

#75

Post by sjamaan »

kaladin-jasnah wrote: post #74
sjamaan wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your parents present you with your first computer when you're five years old, and it drops you to a bash prompt, and that's all you have, then you'll probably know considerably more than everyone else just from that being your only choice for a computing environment. Only if you have the interest and aptitude to dig in. Compare this with OP's story about trying to learn music instruments at an early age, and his…

Yeah. I think it's about exposure, though. You can find your interests, talents, and such more easily if you have the luck to have the smörgåsbord of cool things in life presented to you at a young age.

That really helps, indeed

Re: Talent

#76

Post by akoboldfrying »

unclad5968 wrote: post #62
akoboldfrying wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While reading the article, you found some evidence contradicting a firmly held belief, and decided to keep the belief and discard the new evidence. I would have stopped reading your comment after realising this, but I was already at the end.

A single anecdote about having ideas while taking amphetamines is hardly evidence.

It's not a large or high-quality piece of evidence, but it is most definitely a nonzero amount of evidence.

The evidence provided by any observational study is no more than the sum of many small pieces of evidence exactly like this one.

Re: Talent

#77

Post by SwtCyber »

That line about sweating blood on a strength instead of a weakness? I wish I'd learned that a decade earlier...

Re: Talent

#78

Post by SwtCyber »

kaladin-jasnah wrote: post #4

The author concludes that "I should make sure I sweated blood working on a strength, [and] do more of what comes naturally." Something I found was that sometimes the things I have the most passion and interest for are _not_ the things that are strengths. But they have become strengths. Today, I would consider myself to be an OS and systems programmer person. It was abjectly _not_ something that came to me naturally.…

Soo it's not just about what you're talented at, it's about what you're willing to suffer through

Re: Talent

#79

Post by SwtCyber »

dzink wrote: post #17

I think it has to do with the Brain’s favorite sources of dopamine. If you steer clear of the hedonistic approaches and focus on finding constructive ways to get your dopamine, those constructive ways may give you a living you enjoy. Physics, math, trading, coding, writing are all self-feedback fields you can iterate on in your own to get as good as you want to be. The fact that you don’t depend on others to make pro…

It's like hacking your own reward system

Re: Talent

#80

Post by SwtCyber »

babblingfish wrote: post #3

This reminds me of Oliver Burkeman's insight in "Meditations for Mortals" that we can only control quantity, not quality. He suggests we focus on what's within our control: showing up consistently and doing the work, rather than obsessing over outcomes. Another piece of his advice is to choose pursuits where you have a natural aptitude. Otherwise, there's too much friction. People enjoy being competent. Haruki Muraka…

I think it takes the pressure off and, ironically, usually leads to better work over time
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