Skip to main content

3 Chapter Three: Judging fish based on how well they climb trees

Finding your gifts can be so difficult. You may feel like you should be a good student, a good athlete, a good artist, or a good musician because that is part of your family identity. Or you may avoid pursuing an area of development because a sibling is already good at it, or perhaps it is not valued in your family.

Albert Einstein said, “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” The challenge is not just to figure out if you are a fish or a squirrel or a bird, but what kind of fish you are. Are you fresh or saltwater? Warm or cold water? Bottom feeder or top feeder? Reading 7 Kinds of Smart (on Multiple Intelligences, by Thomas Armstrong) will help you perceive a variety of gifts in yourself (while also helping you recognize and value those in others).

In the game of bridge, you assess the strength of the cards you are dealt, make a bid as to which suit represents your greatest strength and how many cards you will win playing with that suit as trump. The key to success in bridge is correctly assessing your strengths, both by correctly identifying their nature (what you are good at—the suit) and by accurately evaluating their extent, neither understating them (in which case you will bid too low and not achieve your potential) nor overestimating them [in which case you will bid too high and fall short of your goal (your bid) and lose.] It is hard to appreciate the value of this metaphor without knowing how to play, and I recommend learning to play the game, if only to appreciate the power of the metaphor (although you will learn many other things from the game).

The messages of Einstein’s quote and the game of bridge are the same: Be content to discover and develop your gifts and yourself, instead of trying to be someone else or have gifts you really don’t, which will simply lead to frustration and underachievement relative to your true gifts. That takes a lot of self-discipline and introspection—and candid counseling from true friends and mentors. It can be so easy to “lock in” on the first thing at which you excel, closing your mind to other things at which you might be even better—or to give up on something too soon, not realizing that the others you see doing it better have spent long hours of work to get so good. You need to be open to trying many different things, giving your all to each as you try them, and continually assessing your progress and proclivity.

As you do, it’s important to realize that everyone, no matter what a star they are in one area of life, can be displaced and made to feel incompetent and uncomfortable in another, foreign area of life. Consider, for instance, a prominent academic or person who is very famous and respected in her own world, but unknown as she shows up at a dance class. In that environment, she is not a star, and the perception of her by others will depend upon her performance in that environment. She will be “a fish out of water”. Some can maintain self-confidence with humility and get along gracefully in new areas of life, others act like they are still stars and deserve star treatment, and still others might lose their self-identity and confidence and align with the identity given them by the new group. Remember that any area of life is just one part of who you are and that everyone, no matter the station, accomplishments, or stature, feels small sometimes.

Here is an important piece of advice relevant to exploration and development of all gifts: think about how the level of challenge will help you grow. People so often try to get themselves (or parents try to get their children) onto the most competitive team even though they may not be given the chance to play and grow and develop there, or into the most challenging class or school even though they may have trouble being successful and learning there. Others are content to be the star on a team or in a school that does not really challenge them or help them grow. Being challenged can help you grow, but it can be demoralizing if it’s too much. Being the best can help you build confidence, but it can lead to complacence, pride, and even condescension if that’s all you know. Finding a balanced mix of challenge in activities can help you have places to grow, develop confidence, and fit in.

Try lots of things. Give each your all while you are doing it. Seek varied levels of challenge. Listen to good counsel. Seek to know yourself. And have fun! 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Posts

Preface

Before Tom Cruise, Matt Damon, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and even Clint Eastwood, there was John Wayne. The iconic action hero of my youth, “The Duke”, as he was sometimes called, was famous for fighting, shooting, and tough-talking his way through every movie to protect the abused and vanquish the bad guys, wherever they were. To me, his characters seemed a source of stability on which I could build my sense of right and wrong. I loved going to movies to see the most recent John Wayne film, and believed that anything John Wayne did was, by definition, good. He was a role model to me. And then an unsettling thing happened. There, in one of my favorite movies, The Duke was driving while clearly intoxicated. This was before MADD and SADD and national sensitivity to the dangers of drunk driving, but my awareness of the issue had been raised when someone very dear to me had almost been killed by a drunk driver. When that accident happened, I remember wondering why someone would risk lives—t...
Post a Comment
Read more

29 CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE: Don’t be tricked into singing along with lyrics just because the melody is good

It’s hard to understand the emotional effect of music—how soothing, relaxing, uplifting, terrifying, or electrifying a good tune can be. It is scary, however, how easy it is to sing along with virtually any lyrics if the tune is stuck in your head. I always try to understand song lyrics, get their message, and think about why the author wrote them—and often I conclude that the message and motive are inconsistent with my beliefs and perhaps dangerous. And yet, I regularly catch myself humming or playing the tune of such a song in my head, with the lyrics floating along either in my brain or on my lips. While music’s effect may be singular, other things can have similar effects: something or someone of great beauty, an eloquent essay or speaker, a good story or movie, and even a friend. Anything that causes you to let your guard down can have this power. You must be aware of it all of the time. Let me explain why I think it is dangerous to just “sing along” without thinking about t...
Post a Comment
Read more

36 CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX “To will one thing”: Section 8

The Struggle of finding and holding onto Faith The struggle in finding and holding faith seems to me natural, and perhaps healthy and necessary if it is to be your own. It also seems common: there many, many autobiographies of people who struggled and then found faith, but a few that I have found helpful are: •          Surprised by Joy by C.S. Lewis and the play and movie, “The Most Reluctant Convert” about his journey to faith •          Seven Story Mountain by Thomas Merton •          Confessions by Augustine of Hippo, •          A Man Called Peter by Catherine Marshall , and •          The Language of God by Francis Collins. I Did It For You , by Lecrae gives his story in the form of a song. There are also tons of books on faith and belief, especially in relation to reaso...
Post a Comment
Read more