You might remember a story they told us when we were kids. About a man who went on a desperate search to find a magical four-leaf clover. The three leaf clover was easy to find but the four leaf clover had all sorts of special powers. After years searching far and wide, eventually he reluctantly returned home, empty handed and despondent. At which time, while resting in his yard, he looked down to discover what he sought for so long had been right there in his back yard all the time. There in his yard was a four-leaf clover.
Back then I thought the point of the whole story was the magic of the four-leaf clover! Oops missed that one. The actual point is that what we are looking for is right in front of us, yet we think it is somewhere else. In my work, I have particularly found this applies when people go in search of their talent. They look everywhere when it’s right in front of them.
Let me guess something about you. I bet your whole life you have kept certain habits. Many probably drive you crazy and quite likely the people around you point out how ridiculous or predictable this part of you is. Maybe you can’t do any thing by halves? Maybe you are useless when you get rushed? Maybe you always get dragged into help? Or maybe you can’t relax while something is half done? And you know you should change, be more disciplined or something similar. You cringe and are embarrassed that you keep living that same quality over and over. Am I right?
Now let’s think about a rock for a moment. Most people would describe a rock as being solid or strong because the rock is fundamentally very difficult to change. So by that simple logic, if something is fundamentally very difficult to change, it is a strength.
Did you just see the four-leaf clover?
The things you have never been able to change, that you see as weaknesses or disappointments are not that at all. They are your strengths! If they are so difficult to shift, then they must be a strength!
The issue is not that you have a character flaw, the issue is that you are applying your strength to a task that doesn’t match that strength. The rock shouldn’t be a ballerina, it should be a statue! It needs to be something it has the nature for.
At first this will be very difficult to get your head around because for your whole life you have thought these unchangeable qualities in you were flaws. As a result you have spent no time pondering if this unchangeable quality could actually be useful if in the right circumstance.
We spend so much of our life thinking that our talent is somewhere outside of our self and that we need to work hard to learn talent and ‘make it happen’, when the truth is your talent is something you allow to be expressed. You find a platform, medium, forum, skill, industry or role that fundamentally requires the nature you have. As Einstein said “If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will always think it is stupid.” So if you are fish, look for water. If you are a rock, look for a sculpture and if you feel talentless, look in your back yard. What you always thought were your weaknesses are actually your strengths.