Tag: talent

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Talent: blessing or curse?

My last couple of posts got me thinking more about the whole idea of being “talented” and what a mixed bag that can be!

Looking back I realize I had a certain amount of natural ability and facility with music. Things came pretty easily at the start. Of course, then I felt insecure because I didn’t have a clue what I was doing!

That’s the thing, isn’t it? When it all just comes to you naturally, a part of you worries that it could leave just as easily!

The fact is, although I had natural musicality and a beautiful tone, there were lots of other things that I wasn’t doing well at ALL (fixing all my “flute flaws” is where persistence and determination had to make an appearance).

Years later, when I had my own private flute studio, I saw how correcting all those errors in my playing made me a much better teacher. Pretty much anything a student was doing wrong, I had done as well and knew how to go about correcting it.

The only aspect of flute playing that I never felt confident teaching was vibrato. Why? Because when I was in high school the girl who played 1st flute in band did this “thing” with her tone that made her sound better than me. I wasn’t okay with that and determined if she could do it, I could do it. So I did, with absolutely no idea of how. 😄

I received a deeper understanding of all this thanks to a particular flute student. She was in high school, a beautiful and very talented girl who ended up being one of the greatest challenges of my teaching career.

There was simply no way to get her to work. She was quick and bright and had so much natural ability that she could reach a relatively high level with very little effort. So she considered herself an excellent flutist, entitled to praise and adulation, and disregarded most of what I was attempting to teach her.

Finally a light bulb went off for me and I saw how she was a perfect example of the “talented” trap. The truth is that none of us can take credit for any God-given talent that we’ve been blessed with. But what we can take credit for is the energy and effort, the persistence and determination, that we put out to develop our talent.

I’ve seen enough auditions won by seemingly “mediocre” musicians who just kept plugging away to know that if I had to choose, I’d choose persistence, determination, and discipline. Because…nothing is more common than unsuccessful [people] with talent.

On the other hand, when someone has talent and the willingness to work at it, amazing things are possible.

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Talent

“Talent is a pursued interest. Anything that you’re willing to practice, you can do.” Bob Ross

I didn’t even know who Bob Ross was but I really resonated with this quote when I happened upon it earlier today.

What I know from (often bitter) experience is that what we often think of as “talent” can end up being more of a curse than a blessing.

Why?

Well, first of all, it makes it a lot easier for the ego to convince you that you’re “special” because you’re so “talented”…and down that road lies all kinds of pitfalls and potential suffering.

It also makes it harder to learn discipline and even how to practice. After all, if it all comes “easy” in the early stages of playing an instrument you might begin to think that you really are “hot stuff” — having fun and receiving lots of “strokes” — without ever establishing a solid foundation on which to build. There can even be a subtle sense of expecting something for nothing, and that never bodes well for the long run!

The end result is an all too common tendency to get a skewed perspective that’s essentially backwards, where we take credit for being talented, while downplaying the hard work aspect. The truth is that the only thing we CAN take credit for is the energy and effort we put out. We absolutely can NOT take credit for our “talent” or for the qualities and attributes that make us good at something.

I mean, does a professional basketball player take credit for the fact that he’s 7 ft tall? I hope not! But he can certainly take credit for the hours spent learning and then perfecting the skills necessary to excel at his sport.

Over the years of my career as a classical flutist, I came to envy my less “talented” friends; the ones who gained a reputation for their work ethic, plugging away in the practice room and simply getting the job done.

As I learned to be more like them, I developed and refined my skills to where I was eventually able to do a lot more with those unique abilities that I had been blessed with…which ended up being the best of both worlds!