Gravity's Source

What we have come to call talent is a strange concept, known to us only in its expression – the beautiful voice, the “way with words” – and yet perceived as a distinct physical attribute possessed by the talented like red hair or dimples. It reminds me of gravity, which science, since Newton himself, has only managed to show how gravity works but not why. After all, we can’t actually see gravity, except to say, “There it is!” as things fall. And, I suppose, as we are held to the earth, rather than floating away like a bunch flesh and bones balloons.

When my son Jack was four, the school department tested him to determine if he had a learning disability. My wife and I took him to a large room in an old school and watched as a well-meaning woman with a clipboard put him through a series of exercises. At one point she said, “Okay, Jack. Can you walk backward for me?” Jack walked around in a circle chanting, “Walk! Walk! Walk!” She asked him again. Jack ran to his mother and threw his arms around her neck. The woman wrote something down on her clipboard.

“Oh,” said my wife, “Jack knows how to walk backwards. He’s done it plenty.”

“But he didn’t do it when I asked him.”

To which I thought: What if he doesn’t want to? Why should he walk backwards just because this stranger asked him to? What if he doesn’t understand the point? What exactly are we measuring here?

Jack would teach me a lot about talent. For years he was tested, and the results were always depressingly low. I would come to understand that he was never really participating fully in any of those tests. When he brought his full attention to something, whether it was assembling Legos or playing music, suddenly he seemed talented!

You have likely been tested much in your life, sometimes by others, sometimes by circumstance. Perhaps you have not always liked the results, have felt they defined some unflattering limitation in you, especially when compared to someone who thrived where you struggled. Never underestimate the gravitational pull of your authentic interest, which draws your full attention to the fore and remains the only source of that elusive quality we still call talent.

If you like the ideas and perspectives expressed here, feel free to contact me about individual coaching and group workshops.

Everyone Has What It Takes: A Writer’s Guide to the End of Self-Doubt
You can find William at: williamkenower.com