If you've ever thought about or done some lifting, you might be familiar with noob gains If you imagine every skill is a dimension, you'll be able to traverse

If you've ever thought about or done some lifting, you might be familiar with noob gains If you imagine every skill is a dimension, you'll be able to traverse to "proficient/adept" quite easily with some dedicated practice I find the more interesting reflection is how much people overestimate their abilities in the more day to day/mundane skills that everyone has some proficiency in - think "conversation" or separately "running". Both things most humans can do but also most people don't get too much further past novice in them despite being things that we have been doing all our lives. Turns out that without dedicated practice and good feedback loops, it's possible to stay a novice at something your entire life. So for me at least, talent is about your ability to improve at something with little to no direction. When I think of the greatest salespeople I know, they have been honing the skill all life, but they also never had anyone teach them what they needed to know or what was important to learn. And yet when I analyze their lives and realize that from young they were constructing feedback loops for things like "how to be funny" or "how to wow a crowd" or "how to negotiate" with virtually zero guidance, I can only infer that this is what genius looks like...