Actually, there are natural abilities but without hard work they are not used.

Interesting read. I agree with some of the points, but I also find a good point with what Daniel posted above. I agree that everyone is good at something, but it just isn't being fully utilized. Then again, how do you explain child prodigies?

@Daniel, it is not about "Natural abilities", but just simple possibilities focused according personal or cultural interests, attentions and cares, which need to be discovered, developed applied and used.
@Garry, "Hard work" i wouldn't say so.
The real fact is people are above all and first lazy, and even more, than less.
The invention of the wheel is born from our natural and infinite quest of laziness and comfort. (at least it counts for the largest part; we can argue for sure but we will need to spread more complex theories)
So "Talent" and millions of others cultural mythologies or excuses, are here for our mutual human contemplations. We (humans) have to come up with unconscious (or not) mystification philosophies to forgive us from our weaknesses.
The obvious answer to "talent" is Hard work, But laziness will bring you the ultimate solution.
Isn't it more about how to make the most out of the minimum (of efforts)?
Here comes the clever, the smart but i would mentioned him like the curious, the observer, the creative (or known as) facing hard workers, techs and others "know it all".
Those laziests then become hard workers as well, but to save themselves sooner, faster, from the hard work they are facing too, and solve what others do not take (or have) the time to look after.
Isn't it better to learn how to learn?
Discover how to discover?
And what about create creativity?

What can I work hard on to grow taller?

I had this discussion with a friend of mine a while back.

His view is that there is no such thing as talent, and that everything in life comes from working hard to achieve whatever it is that you want.

I actually disagree, to some extent. I believe that each of us is born with certain genetic traits that allow us to have natural easiness towards certain things, be it music, sports, programming, etc. Of course that it can be argued that anyone, no matter their natural "talent", can achieve the same results, but I think that - if you go to extreme situations, say olympic records, where everyone gives 110% of their effort - those that do not possess these natural traits will never be as good as the ones that do.

I think, in the end, it's all in the genes. Of course, hard work goes a long way :)

the arguments against this mostly come from the concept of "meritocracy" that's been pushed in our culture since the 1960's. Meritocracy is basically wealthy people telling us we (the middle class) are better than the people below us (the poor) because we're smart and they're dumb. If they were smart, they would join us and no longer be poor. If we're smart enough, we'll become very wealthy, because we deserve it. This helps us feel better about ourselves and keeps us from questioning social boundaries. People love feeling superior.

Love this quote!

You should read Outliers... and after that, give a search on 'outliers' at Seth Godin's site. Both have interesting points... obviously Seth is pushing his book The Drip... but great thoughts.

btw, if you've heard of Hellen Keller... tell me she has Talent... tell me she didn't work hard.... yeah right!

Hello to all, and thank you (Garry) for linking my blog post to your blog, this means a lot to somebody who posts his second blog article.
Perhaps there is talent, but using 'no-talent' as an excuse for depriving oneself of progress is wrong, and that person probably lies to himself or herself.
Again, thank you for dedicating your time to read my post.
-Apologetic Writing (http://apologeticwriting.blogspot.com)

I believe in mind hacks -- I think this is a form of one. Think about this:

1) If a person is more innately talented than others and knows it, they are less likely to work hard and more likely to coast. Net negative outcome. They do not get to where they could have been / reach their full potential.

2) If a person is less talented innately than others and knows it, they are more likely to be discouraged. Again, net negative outcome -- mostly -- unless that person also REALLY wants to be good at what they are less talented at, in which case that can spur one to do great work.

So even if talent does exist, I prefer to ignore its existence and focus on that which I can control. Extraordinary things can happen when you hack your mind to get the most out of yourself. Heck, Spud Webb won the dunk championship.

Working intelligently is always essential -- banging away at something is an insane waste of resources. I was just talking to a friend recently about how so many startups fail. They don't fail because they are untalented -- they fail because they never ship their product and are wasting resources banging away at things that don't help them ship the product.

Ignoring talent is as bass ackwards as blaming no-talent for one's lack of success in life (in whatever manner one wants to define success for themselves, of course). Innate talents can be refined and hard work can make up for lack of innate talent. Even so I don't think it's six of one or half a dozen of the other. Those with innate talent will gather their spoils with a lot less effort than those who choose to compensate for lack of talent with hard work.

I think everyone has a talent (some more obviously than others) so I'm not sure what the point is of working ones self to the bone to achieve something for which you don't have a talent. I say hone the talent(s) you have and make them work for you. Do not covet they neighbour's talents ;)

And because I like what Oli had to say and I like TED here's a link to what I think is an inspiring and thought provoking talk given on creative genius by Elizabeth Gilbert.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/elizabeth_gilbert_on_genius.html

You truncated that comment. The first half of it is "I think everyone has a talent." With that particular talent, you may have a bright future in tabloid journalism ;)

As for destiny, that, to me, seems like just another way to blame someone/something other than yourself for lack of success.

I guess ultimately my point is that none of this is a binary as this discussion would suggest. It's not a matter of talent/no-talent or destiny/hard work. Sometimes people work their asses off to no avail (maybe due to complete lack of innate talent? inability to recognize opportunities? some other factor that hasn't been mentioned?). I think it's a combination of both talent and the willingness to put it to work for you (which requires work on your part) and the ability to recognize and seize opportunities when they present themselves to you vs sitting around waiting for success to fall into your lap (destiny). Essentially, you need to make your own success and part of that is being able to put your talents to work and seize opportunities ... to which Edison said "Opportunity is missed by most people because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work."

:)

Wow, must be nice seeing the world in such stark, simple terms! Wish I could do that. I see everyone as generally similar but specifically different, handling different tasks, different ways. I've seen people with no "built-in" talent become rich and I've seen people who no talent who work hard become rich. I've also seen people work hard and fail, and people who luck into everything while barely lifting a finger.

Telling all people that they need to work hard is crap. What does "hard work" even mean? Did that Madoff guy work hard when he lied to all those people and took their money? Did the slaves work hard on the plantations?

Who worked harder? A slave on a plantation or Warren Buffett?

This whole thing is just an attempt to create a sense of control in each of us. "All people are this way or that."

There, doesn't that feel better? More confident that there are rules in the universe of people?

I feel that we need to face each person on a case by case basis, learn from others and judge only ourselves.

So, there. :P

10,000 hour rule here. They say Bill Gates spent 10k hours programming from being a kid to starting Microsoft, same with others in their fields. It's unclear that Gates was THAT smart of a programmer, but he was so damned tenacious (breaking into labs at night to code) and consistent (breaking into labs every night) that it added up. I like this explanation better than just he was talented. Also people overestimate child prodigies. Bobby Fischer played chess nearly every waking hour by age 12 and had read more literature on chess than anyone by his mid-teens.

So does that amount to tenacity (ie hard work) or compulsively following an obsessive interest? Having a child who has obsessive interests myself it doesn't seem like a conscious choice to work hard at something. Compulsion seems more accurate.

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