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6th grade Wood Shop was the bane of my existence for however many weeks it lasted. I could no more hammer a nail into wood at a 90 degree angle than I could pilot a space ship. Effective hammering takes skills and talents I do not possess -- namely, good depth perception and eye-hand coordination. Sure, with practice, I could improve my ability in this area. But, do you know what? I have a deficiency in depth perception and an astigmatism, so any task requiring good eye-hand coordination will not be my forte. For example, in games with flying balls, I tend to duck and cover. I am OK with not being excellent at everything. There were several boys at my lab table in shop class who liked me well enough to help me through the project. The memo scroll I (we) created still lives somewhere in my mother's memorabilia. Wood Shop class taught me much more than how to use a jigsaw to carve a scroll and how to flirt with boys to get their help.
I learned at a young age to focus on developing my natural talents and abilities. According to positive psychology, you see stronger results going this route than trying to correct areas of weakness. In the intervening (ahem) 20+ years since middle school, I have honed my persuasion skills to a fine point. I suck people into projects and ideas all the time. 20 years of building on an innate talent has exponentially increased my skills in influencing others. 20 years of trying to hammer nails into wood has not yielded such amazing results. If I go slow, take my time, and concentrate very hard, I have a 50-50 shot at getting my nail to go in at a 90 degree angle. Really. After all that time and practice. It's much more efficient (and safer) to outsource that task to my husband!
Do you know your own strengths? I'm not asking how much you can bench press; rather, I'm curious about what you know well and love to do. One of my strengths is talking. To myself or to other people (doesn't really matter). In fact, I have taken the Clifton Strengths Finder and according to that instrument, my top strengths are: Input, Strategic, Maximizer, Individualization, Positivity, Ideation, and WOO (Winning Others Over).
Yes, I have taken it twice - several strengths were repeated and a couple were added. Conventional (Strengths Finder) Wisdom says that your first list of strengths is primary and any repetition of the assessment just uncovers additional strengths. If you want to know more about what each of these strengths means, you can check out the Strength Finder 2.0 book (which, newly bought, comes with a code to take the assessment one time). In general, I think they fit me perfectly. I crave new information (input) and tend to think about how one thread connects to another and how patterns fit and can be optimized (strategic). As a teacher or consultant, I strive to help each individual find recognize their own strengths (maximizer) and chart their unique path building on these strengths (individualizer). I've learned from life experiences that a positive outlook makes for a completely different playing field, so I value the pluses over the minuses (positivity). My core strengths, though, are generating ideas and solutions (ideation) -- typically, workable ones -- and influencing people (WOO).
Esteemed author Malcolm Gladwell says that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to spit-shine your skills until they gleam and earn you fame and acclaim. 10,000 hours is a lot of time doing one thing again and again -- whether that is playing chess, practicing piano, hammering nails, or talking to people. Now, you have to be thinking: What can I do really well? What do I most enjoy doing? Where do I want to be in 20 years? What can I do well now that I would like to be able to do brilliantly in the future?
Let's imagine that you spend 8 hours a day developing your core talent. To reach the 10,000 hour mark, you will need to spend 1,250 days working at the skill you identify. That is, more or less, around 3.5 years of spending 8 hours a day (7 days a week) working on that skill. If you take weekends, holidays, or vacations -- or put in shorter days, then that 3.5 years could double, triple, or even quadruple. Who in the world wants to spend that much time perfecting a skill that doesn't make their life brighter and more enjoyable?
Not I, to be sure. Ever since my parents dubbed me "Motor Mouth" at the tender age of 4, I have loved talking to people. I talk to a great many different people on a regular basis, both in person and electronically. Even after all this time and practice, though, I know there is always room for improvement. So, I will continue my strength building for the next 20, 40, however many years.
My wish for you is that you, too, can find the strengths you want to spend 10,000 hours developing and then enjoy the journey towards (and beyond) that goal. You don't have to forsake your metaphorical hammer (weakness) entirely, just accept that you have limitations that will remain limitations. As the Army says, be all that you can be -- find your power.
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I learned at a young age to focus on developing my natural talents and abilities. According to positive psychology, you see stronger results going this route than trying to correct areas of weakness. In the intervening (ahem) 20+ years since middle school, I have honed my persuasion skills to a fine point. I suck people into projects and ideas all the time. 20 years of building on an innate talent has exponentially increased my skills in influencing others. 20 years of trying to hammer nails into wood has not yielded such amazing results. If I go slow, take my time, and concentrate very hard, I have a 50-50 shot at getting my nail to go in at a 90 degree angle. Really. After all that time and practice. It's much more efficient (and safer) to outsource that task to my husband!
Do you know your own strengths? I'm not asking how much you can bench press; rather, I'm curious about what you know well and love to do. One of my strengths is talking. To myself or to other people (doesn't really matter). In fact, I have taken the Clifton Strengths Finder and according to that instrument, my top strengths are: Input, Strategic, Maximizer, Individualization, Positivity, Ideation, and WOO (Winning Others Over).
Yes, I have taken it twice - several strengths were repeated and a couple were added. Conventional (Strengths Finder) Wisdom says that your first list of strengths is primary and any repetition of the assessment just uncovers additional strengths. If you want to know more about what each of these strengths means, you can check out the Strength Finder 2.0 book (which, newly bought, comes with a code to take the assessment one time). In general, I think they fit me perfectly. I crave new information (input) and tend to think about how one thread connects to another and how patterns fit and can be optimized (strategic). As a teacher or consultant, I strive to help each individual find recognize their own strengths (maximizer) and chart their unique path building on these strengths (individualizer). I've learned from life experiences that a positive outlook makes for a completely different playing field, so I value the pluses over the minuses (positivity). My core strengths, though, are generating ideas and solutions (ideation) -- typically, workable ones -- and influencing people (WOO).
Esteemed author Malcolm Gladwell says that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to spit-shine your skills until they gleam and earn you fame and acclaim. 10,000 hours is a lot of time doing one thing again and again -- whether that is playing chess, practicing piano, hammering nails, or talking to people. Now, you have to be thinking: What can I do really well? What do I most enjoy doing? Where do I want to be in 20 years? What can I do well now that I would like to be able to do brilliantly in the future?
Let's imagine that you spend 8 hours a day developing your core talent. To reach the 10,000 hour mark, you will need to spend 1,250 days working at the skill you identify. That is, more or less, around 3.5 years of spending 8 hours a day (7 days a week) working on that skill. If you take weekends, holidays, or vacations -- or put in shorter days, then that 3.5 years could double, triple, or even quadruple. Who in the world wants to spend that much time perfecting a skill that doesn't make their life brighter and more enjoyable?
Not I, to be sure. Ever since my parents dubbed me "Motor Mouth" at the tender age of 4, I have loved talking to people. I talk to a great many different people on a regular basis, both in person and electronically. Even after all this time and practice, though, I know there is always room for improvement. So, I will continue my strength building for the next 20, 40, however many years.
My wish for you is that you, too, can find the strengths you want to spend 10,000 hours developing and then enjoy the journey towards (and beyond) that goal. You don't have to forsake your metaphorical hammer (weakness) entirely, just accept that you have limitations that will remain limitations. As the Army says, be all that you can be -- find your power.
DQQ59DNENZYG SP6HMDPJBAGK
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