Talent and Effort

Baxter's Buzz

I'm a big sports fan. I understand that these professional athletes are the best in the world. I was watching the Fab Five documentary on ESPN last night when I saw Grant Hill in his Duke jersey. I wondered if people remember how great of a player he was for his years in Detroit as a Piston.

He was blessed athletically, but he also was one of the hardest working guys, if not the hardest working guy. Of course injuries cost him many years so who knows how much better he would have become.

The one thing I know is that he showed up every year better than he was before. There were people nowhere near as talented as Hill but failed to get the most out of their talents. The same can be said for some who were more talented. "Leaving much more in the tank".

How can anyone allow a person who's naturally more gifted than them also out work them?

I feel that many guys in the NBA got the most out of their talent. Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Bill Russell, and John Stockon to name a few, squeezed everything they had out of the talent they were given. Some guys like Vince Carter, Shaq, Chris Webber, who were immensely talented, never "pushed it" to see how great they could truly be.

Do you push yourself on a daily basis to be great? Are you a talented slacker who is skating by on natural gifts alone? If so, why haven't you attempted to shoot for the stars? Are you an average talent who is always one step from being out the door because not only are you not the gifted, you're lazy?

Do you care about trying to make up the performance gap between you and your more talented coworkers? Do you plan to do anything different?

I know I haven't gotten the most out of my talent and it frustrates me to no end when I still have so much give. But at what point does potential go out the window and you just are who you are? When you go from a "coulda been" to a "never will be"?