The Miracle of Talent
Pursuing the New
Two weeks ago, I challenged you to “pursue the new.” I encouraged you to dream of something important, make an intentional plan, build some habits, and make some steady growth. The past two weeks, I have definitely been taking my own advice. I’ve been very intentional about pursuing some new skill sets with daily, deliberate practice. I’ve worked on content development skills to grow as a writer and presenter. I’ve played with website development skills as I try to simplify user interface. I’ve experimented with ways to prepare for and record podcast more efficiently. And I’ve studied and played with different social media platforms that I may incorporate in this “Optimal Day Project.” In addition to this, I have also continued to work in my new role as jail chaplain. I’ve learned a lot about this position, but I still have so much to learn as I work to better understand and best meet the needs of those I serve. These pursuits in addition to teaching, coaching, and parenting are all part of my wildly important goal. To love, enjoy, inspire, encourage, and positively impact those in my circle of influence. So I guess you can say this has definitely been a big week of pursuing the new in order to reach and stretch toward my big goals.
It’s All Coming Together
At first glance, it looks like my interests and pursuits are all over the map, but really I believe things are converging and coming together nicely. My vision and mission are coming into focus, and I’m gaining more and more clarity on the direction of this Optimal Day Project. Ultimately the message of this project is pretty simple. I want to live life better and help others do the same. That's the reason behind my mission and this project. I love sharing resources. I love seeing growth and development. I love the excitement of change as we all pursue our own “something new.” I like to say that when I grow up, I want to be a life coach and a resource liaison. With this in mind, it’s fun to think of how things have been coming together recently. As a parent, teacher, coach, and volunteer, I’m just looking for and finding ways to inspire, encourage, and impact. And it’s pretty awesome that I get to practice and improve these skills and immediately put them into practice.
Rediscovery
Speaking of sharing, I started experimenting with book studies in my podcasts. I chose to share these books because they are amazing resources. And as I share them, I get to work on improving my practice of preparing materials and presenting. Last week, I focused on Hal Elrod’s book, The Miracle Morning. This week, I’m looking at Daniel Coyle’s The Little Book of Talent. This is excellent timing to rediscover these books. The lessons really apply to my current pursuits. Originally, I read these books to help me teach my tennis players good habits and fundamentals, but these lessons are perfect for developing my own skills needed as I craft the Optimal Day Project. Sharing resources as a writer and presenter is like any skill. It requires time and practice. It requires commitment to a long term goal and daily action. It requires a miracle. Wait, what?!
What’s Up With The Title?
So talent is a miracle. Not in the definition 1: “extraordinary event manifesting divine intervention in human affairs” kind of way. But in the definition 2, “an extremely outstanding or unusual event, thing, or accomplishment” kind of way (thanks MW). Talent is miraculous because it is an extremely outstanding accomplishment to stick with the fundamentals and develop skills. Talent is miraculous because it requires commitment, daily action, time, and patience. Those are unusual qualities. But I hope to adopt those unusual qualities in order to develop skills and talents. How about you? Are you willing to be unusual in order to be extremely outstanding? It’s the miracle of talent. Sticking with something new and finding that eventually it all comes together.
Be patient and wait for the miracle.
Enjoy the day!