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5 Ways To Find Your Hidden Talents

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April 20, 2011

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According to the dictionary, a talent is a natural endowment of a person. It is an ability or natural capacity that we have, which may range from our creativity to our athletic abilities. We all have them, but we are not always so good at identifying what they are. Sometimes they can be right in front of us, and we miss them.

 

If you can determine what your talents are, you can tap into an amazing resource that can help you in every aspect of your life, including your business. Whether you are searching for the perfect type of business to open or you want to find ways to grow the one you have, you may find the answer in your personal talents.

 

Ways to Discover

 

Ask 10 people what their talents are and you are bound to get a variety of responses, many of which will include that they simply don’t know. How can that be, you ask? Because people are often too close to what is going on for them to notice their natural abilities. So these gems go unnoticed and untapped, for years!

 Want to read more about finding your passion? Check these out:

 

Finding your talent is actually much easier than you may realize. Here are 5 simple ways to find your hidden talents:

 

1.   Listen to others. Those around you usually know what your talents are, even when you don’t. If you think about it, people have likely been telling you that you are good at something for a long time. You just weren’t listening. Now is the time to listen.

 

2.   Determine what is easy. Are there things that you find really easy or obvious to do, while others may struggle or muddle their way through? If you have things that you find super easy, you believe that they should be just as easy, or obvious, for others, but that’s not how it plays out. In this scenario, they struggle while you stand there feeling like it was a cake walk!

 

3.   What you enjoy most. Your talents may be demonstrating itself in other ways. Are there magazine topics that you just can’t get enough of? Are there shows you love? Think about what it is that you love to do most when you have free time. If you are drawn toward it, it is a natural talent.

 

4.   Shut up already. Is there a specific subject that you love to talk about, often to the point that your friends want to shoot you? Consider the subject, perhaps it may be one of your hidden talents or is connected to one.

 

5.   Just ask. Ask everyone you know that will give you an honest assessment about what they think your talents are. Ask them to ignore your bad habits and have them share the one or two things that they think you are hands down most talented at. Ask a lot of people who know you, but always ask them one-on-one. Compile the results and there is your hidden talent.

 

Key Components

 

When you know what your talents are, you feel more in tune with your life. You can also use those talents to excel in the business world. Whether you leverage those talents in your product or service, or you use them to network and make quality connections, they are important to know. When you capitalize on your talents, it no longer feels like work, it just feels like living. And anything that makes business and life more enjoyable is bound to be a good thing. 

What do you think?

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Join the conversation ( 3 )

  • Vince Skolny 1 year 1 months and 3 days ago

    Vince Skolny

    I like the slant here: "When you know what your talents are, you feel more in tune with your life. You can also use those talents to excel in the business world."Not every talent has to be the nucleus of our career or business pursuits, but they can all contribute to the overall value of our lives and the impact business has on them.

  • Marty L. Ward 1 year 1 months and 5 days ago

    Marty L. Ward

    Talents, Abilities and Gifts are the key to being flexible, relevant and to live a satisfying life. The ability - what you are just born knowing who to do, or the thing you can can the easiest, is what you get paid the most for. The How To getting paid for it is charge them what they are worth! You value them and their potential contribution to the world. Place the price tag on that. When you under charge what you are worth, you are doing the work for your own satisfaction. When you charge a fair amount for the value you are providing, you are doing it for their benefit and not your own. That is the bell weather of knowing if you are on track. Valuing what comes naturally is a challenge since it feels so easy- how can you charge for THAT. Yet, how brilliant to learn that being who we are has the MOST value. Wow. So glad I answered this post as the realization that "being who we are has the MOST value" is the answer to my frustration of understanding this myself. So lets go forth and make money valuing who we are for what comes naturally.

  • Allen Laudenslager 1 year 1 months and 6 days ago

    Allen Laudenslager

    While I like Mike's writing (his blog is on my RSS feed so I don't miss it) it tend to leave out the how element. I know what I'm good at but after 50 years still haven't figured out how to get people to pay me to do it!

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