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I’ll give a slightly different take, but I think your general anecdote and life experience is on point. Talent measures your intuition level regarding somethin

I’ll give a slightly different take, but I think your general anecdote and life experience is on point. Talent measures your intuition level regarding something. So, in your example, Kevin could always reach competence, but Kevin’s afterburner capacity is set to 0% (capped). Some of us have 0-100% intuition on things, on a spectrum. But as far as what it takes to make it in this world? Competence. Your afterburners can boost depending on it’s capacity, but you can’t run on that unless you are born with a god like afterburner tank (genius, your Einsteins). We are all limited, even the talented.

michaelbrave 6y ago
I feel like what you refer to as intuition other's refer to as taste, to quote Ira Glass: “Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.” and to keep with the other comments I would argue that some people have more taste than others, or more passion, or transferable skills that carry over, which often translates into what we think of as natural talent. But it still takes some work.

michaelbrave 6y ago

I feel like what you refer to as intuition other's refer to as taste, to quote Ira Glass: “Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.” and to keep with the other comments I would argue that some people have more taste than others, or more passion, or transferable skills that carry over, which often translates into what we think of as natural talent. But it still takes some work.