The Triad of Talent, Effort & Reward

The Universe is a perpetual recycler. We see it in action at every turn. The freshly sprouted, bright green leaf of a tree darkens with time, eventually turning a shade of yellow or reddish brown until, one day, it falls off. This leaf is subsumed by the earth or consumed by a worm. Next spring, there may appear a delicate sprig of grass. Who’s to say it didn’t emerge from the energy released by the autumnal leaf?

A MATTER OF TIME

The Universe has existed for 13 billion years, give or take a few hundred million. Imagine an expanse of time so vast, one can treat millions of years as an approximation. Now compare that to the average life span of a human being. 80 years. 90 or a 100 if you’ve been good, or lucky.

Do our lives have any meaning? I ask because regardless of how hard we work at building our sand castles, the unrelenting tide of time washes them away. Or so it appears.

If everything in the Universe is a form of energy, and energy can only be transformed and never destroyed, is that also true of all the effort we plough into our passions? Does it live on too in another form or on another plane? Does it show up in other lives as a sort of interest accrued on an investment made long ago? I hope for such poetic justice on a transcendental scale.

Perhaps, that's one way to explain the talent of a veritable child prodigy like Mozart who was composing music at an age when most kids are learning to tie their shoelaces. Or the incredibly gifted Srinivasa Ramanujan, one of the greatest self-taught mathematicians of all time, who worked out complex theorems with barely any formal education beyond high school mathematics. Is it possible that the invisible hand of synchronicity connects the labour of one lifetime with its reward in another?

I’ll get back to the reward but first, let’s talk about a famous musician.

THE RIGHT NOTE

There’s a video of Grammy-winning singer-songwriter, Ed Sheeran from his appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show a few years ago. During the show, Sheeran played an old recording of himself, singing. It’s not just awful, it’s painful. That was the point of it. Ed played it to prove how little of his success is down to pure god-gifted talent.

It’s not my contention that natural talent doesn't exist. Of course, it does. However, very few people have such immense reserves of innate ability that they can go out onto the world stage, without putting in some serious work. Most people, celebrated for their talent, have worked very hard to polish their gifts.

There’s a theory about how it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become really good at something. For each person who becomes a successful musician, sportsperson or entrepreneur, there are tens who may have been more talented but didn’t work as hard.

Many years ago, there lived a man, talented but careless about completing his projects. His saving grace, however, was that he was willing to outwork his contemporaries in unimaginable ways, dedicating years to polishing his knowledge and technique. He said,

“God sells us all things at the price of labour.”

The man’s name was Leonardo da Vinci.

THE ILLUSORY TALE OF NATURAL TALENT

Yet, the idea of ‘innate talent’ has such a stranglehold on popular perception. Why is that? I reckon it soothes our egos to believe that another’s achievements are a result of being born with natural ability instead of discipline, determination and labour. This idea keeps us safe from the damning knowledge that while we pretend to lack natural talent, we’re really just avoiding putting in the work and shying away from the awkwardness of failed attempts.

Now, I don’t mean to say that all of us are capable of great things in every field. Not at all. One look at my early attempts at water colour painting wiped out any artistic illusions I may have harboured! Your nemesis may be gymnastics or singing. That’s fine. Not everything is for everyone. But I’m willing to bet you could be good at something you enjoy, if you only practise.

KEEP AT IT

That brings us to motivation. That motivation is fleeting hardly needs to be stated. What makes many of us persevere when we rather give up, is either discipline or fear of punishment. There is also the glimmer of a reward in the future that can keep us going.

However, I recommend something better. Follow your passion, interest or calling. Put in the effort without obsessing over any potential reward. Just know that your reward is on its way, and will arrive when it is due. That may be next year, twenty years later or even in another lifetime. What is yours will come to you because it is owed, and because the Universe is an excellent accountant.