Understanding our natural talents and key strengths

Understanding our natural talents and key strengths 

We often hear today’s world being universally described as continuously changing, so it’s important to be able to adapt and know if our natural talents or key strengths will help us succeed in life.

In 2008, Frederic Hudson published a paper ‘The context of coaching’ where he discussed the difficulty society now has to connect the different chapters of life, from childhood, through to adulthood and onto our elder years. He felt our perception of the world had slowly but surely shifted from a stable, orderly, steady state model, to an unstable, disorderly change driven one.

We know that many successful people build their lives around one or more natural talents or key strengths and focus on them or spend time developing them. This helps them adapt to change and is normally because they don’t want to waste any time improving themselves in areas they know they will never excel.

Quote:

“Use what talents you possess; the woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.”

Henry Van Dyke

What is a talent?

This is normally seen as a gift or an area of life where we naturally excel. This enables us to take pleasure in possessing this special skill and enjoy knowing we are good at something. We do however tend to take our talents for granted. This is because it’s more or less inherent in us from a young age. So we do not always recognize their true value unless it’s being pointed out by somebody else.

Remember: Any positive character trait that can be put into practice is a talent. So by identifying and using our skills or natural talents helps us become who we are.

What is a strength?

This is a skill or natural talents that manifests itself at an early age. However, it is then nurtured through knowledge and developed through practice. This helps us acquire the ‘know-how’ needed to turn something naturally inherent in us, into a key strength. This can then be successfully applied as a task or action.

Remember: It may not always be possible to completely copy a key strength we see in others. This is because knowledge and practice alone is no substitute for a true skill or natural talent.