FINDING A BALANCE: Talent And Side-Hustle
Your talent is God’s gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God. Leo Buscaglia
The Basic Concept Of Talent
A Talent (or gift, or aptitude) is the skill that someone naturally has to do something that is hard. It is an ability that someone is born with. People say they are “born with a talent”. It is a high degree of ability or of aptitude. Someone who has talent is able to do something without trying as hard as someone who does not have a talent. Someone who has talent is called talented. Talented people as rule have many talents, for music, dancing, acting, sports, or other skills, but often only in single direction or genre, unlike genius.
Talent and Skills
Talent reflects how you’re hard-wired. That’s what sets the concept apart from that of knowledge or skills. Talent dictates your moment-by-moment reactions to your environment — there’s an instinctiveness, an immediacy implied. Talent results in consistently recurring patterns of thought or behavior. To deviate from those patterns requires conscious effort, and such deviations are difficult to sustain.
Knowledge and skills, on the other hand, imply learned behavior, actions that require more active cognitive processing. What you know reveals more about your experiences and education than about who you are at the core. Behavior derived from knowledge and skills can be changed far more easily than talent-based behavior
The difference between talent and skill is hardwork. As the common saying goes;
“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
Everyone has Talents
There are only two kinds of people in life: The talented, and the ones that have not discovered their talents.
The talented know they are talented and they use it in their everyday life. They are the ones that have gone ahead to develop their talents into skills. Beyonce knew she could sing, she practiced severally, was rejected so many times, but then, she did not stop at one, she kept going till she sang “Halo”, and boom, she’s a star. The magic there is that she converted her talents into skills.
Those that have refused to discover their talents know they have it but are not ready to use it. You know you can dance, yet you don’t want to get trained to become skilled in dancing, you are no less different from the ignoramus in your society.
This Generation…
We already have enough lawyers, we have enough doctors, we have enough teachers, we have enough artistes, we have enough bankers, we have enough engineers, but, we do not have enough entrepreneurs.
We need people who are ready to transfer their talents into skills and make a living out of it. We as youths should be ready to go through rigorous training to develop our talent and make us sell-able.
In a time like this, where the old gets the job and the young are left on the streets to wait for their turn, we should not be idle. Get busy, work hard, make a living.
The only difference between a hardworking man and a lazy man is their courage. The fear of taking bold steps will surely leave you behind.
What Should We Do Then?
Firstly, discover your talents: Find out what you love doing the most or what you know God has blessed you with that is extremely priceless. Be it singing, dancing, joking, playing games, drawing, make up etc.
Develop it into a Skill: Once you have discovered your talent, go for trainings, study online, ask for help from an authority in that field, gain more knowledge on it, meet people and don’t be scared to ask questions. This will expose you to the many attributes of that talent that you did not know earlier. Train yourself, read wide and practice. While doing these, don’t forget to enjoy it and have fun
Make a living: Now that you’ve developed it, don’t be scared to make a living out of it. Advertise yourself to people. Promote your work. When you go to seminars, meet people, tell them what you do. Don’t forget to have your advert strategy, either through flyers, cards, voice notes, Rebroadcasts, pictures, videos etc. Also, get a brand name and boom, you’re good to go.
While doing all these… Don’t forget to keep developing yourself. No man is an island. We learn everyday, therefore, keep learning, keep training yourself, that’s the best you can do to be the best in it.
Money must be made…
In view of all these, whether profit or loss, keep working, praying and reading. God helps those who help themselves.
