Finding Your Talent

Dream Big, Dream the right thing

It was many moons ago when my brother told me I had to be more specific about what I wanted out of life, when I told him I wanted to be “successful” and “make a lot of money”. His question troubled me for years, and it still does to this day. In pursuit of this success, you must A) find a talent and B) pursue and practice that talent every day. Even the greatest, richest, smartest people in the world found this to be true. There are no exceptions to this rule and the steps. Sports are a great example. Lebron James and Michael Jordan are specimens like none other, with both there God gifted athletcism, and basketball ability. Even in my own life, I knew my chance at the NBA was quite unlikely early on. Even for my brother, who was one of the best players on Long Island, he knew quite early he wasn’t gonna make it to the NBA. Still went to college for free. He found this out by playing, well, actual NBA Players who play in the NBA today, at tournaments around New York State.

I am not here to say that folks in the NBA did not pour hours of practice into their craft to become the players they are today. I am here to note that they found their talent and put every ounce of energy they had into it.

And I will say before I forget, that this article was inspired by the great Amanda Haverstick, Author of Dear 1L. Her comment (below) lit off a brain blast to write all this. So, thanks, Amanda, for the inspiration!

While I haven’t quite been able to figure out number 3 (please help if you have suggestions), 1 and 2, I may have figured them out.

Long ago, when I was brought into this world, I did not speak. I was mute! Not because I did not want to speak, but because I had an underdeveloped jaw. I was a couple of months late on the whole first words thing, and to make matters worse, I had a habit of pointing, rather than speaking about what I wanted. My brothers would fall for my trap, as for my mother… she knew better.

Fast forward a couple of years, starting in Kindergarten, I was a shy kid. Maybe my apprehension towards school started earlier than expected. Around adults, I would hide behind my parents, and the whole shy kid nine yards. But at home, I would put everyone in the torture rack of Nate's talking time. It still happens to this day! I have a lot to say.

Nevertheless, as I grew older, I began to grow out of this shyness, as noted in 4th grade when I was moved from my desk because of talking, and continued to talk to myself, alone, at a desk away from any student who could respond. As the years went by, I became much more comfortable than I was, and off to college I went. Then, in my Junior year, I thought I would take this obsession with talking to the next level, and start my Lawyers in the Making Podcast. After 40 or so episodes, everything became muscle memory as it is today. I found my talent of speaking, communicating, and even public speaking, and have poured over 150 hours into it. Still so much to learn.

This also goes with writing these articles as well. I have notebooks stretching back years of my personal writing. Most of it is just a spilling of my thoughts and ideas in my head. On occasion, if I feel like I’m stuck, I’ll go back and read some of my old stuff; it’s a goldmine of ideas.

And I would concede that it took me 19 years to find out what I was truly talented at, and even then, I could be wrong, and there is something else lingering within me that I am more talented at. It took years of trial and error to find out what the crossroads were of what I was naturally good at and what I enjoyed. My advice is always the same. Try everything and once you find it, stick with it for as long as you can.