Volunteerism: Prepare. Prepare. Prepare.

It is common to find people who are intelligent, and talented, however, what is rare is finding people who have the will to work hard, and apply themselves to succeed. I learned that I am not intellectually gifted, but it has not stopped me from being successful. The reason for this is that I am a hard worker, and I prepare adequately for the challenges that I am about to face in any setting.

I have had the opportunity to work with some of the most talented people I know. For instance, I had this friend who could run a 100 meters dash at approximately 10 seconds on a good day. We saw him as the next Usain Bolt. However, he even failed to get a university scholarship. The reason for this was that he believed his hype, and never trained. After all, for many years he had beaten opponents and he hardly trained. In the end, students who put time and effort in their craft started defeating him, and he gave up without testing his limits. He was not used to working hard, and when it became clear that he needed to work hard to become competitive he was unable to do it.

It has been proven that in most situations, hard work beats talent. This does not mean that it is wrong to apply one’s natural intelligence to gain an advantage in a situation such as retaining information quickly and efficiently when learning. However, by only relying on such talents, it will not guarantee success. In addition to that, students who mainly rely on only using their talents end up getting used to coming up with shortcuts to deal with any challenge. Woe unto them if they meet a challenge that cannot be tackled using their shortcuts, they automatically end up failing. This means that it is important to teach students from a young age to value hard work and apply it in everything that they do. It will create a positive mentality whereby they know that they have to work hard to succeed. Hard work can lead to achievement of set goals. 

Talent: Listen First

For a majority of people, they have no problem talking, the challenge that they have is that they do not know how to listen. The reason for this is that listening is a skill that has to be effectively developed through patience and time. I have learned that to effectively listen to what other people are saying, I have to create an environment where they can naturally express themselves. It provides me with the opportunity to interpret their verbal and non-verbal cues and get their actual message. I credit this to basketball.

People assume that to be a great basketball player one has to be tall, be an athletic freak and shoot three and two-pointers at will. While that helps, only a few people can be that lucky. For the rest of us to be a good player you have to respond to what the opponent gives you. For instance, when I am passed the ball, I will assess how a defender is approaching me, the side that is being favored for me to attack them. As a defender I look at the pose of the opponent to determine whether they want to shoot, dribble and drive, or pass to determine my defensive stance.

I have applied the physical lessons that I have learned in basketball to my everyday life, and that is why I have become a great listener. Just as is the case in basketball whereby my opponent makes a move, and I respond, I apply it in listening. I let the other party communicate as I listen to their words, observe their facial expressions, body posture, and body movement. All these cues are providing me with the actual message that the other person is communicating. I then respond accordingly. I have learned that to become a great communicator or to facilitate a conversation, it is important to suppress my needs, and provide other people with the opportunity, and the right environment to express themselves. By creating a comfortable situation, people can become more articulate, and this helps me understand what they want to improve our communication. 

Unique: My Emotive Power

Most people use different techniques to win the approval of people. For some they will act in a manner that they will feel will be impressive to the people that they want to please, and for others, they will pretend in a manner that makes them sound sentimental. Do not get me wrong, things such as public presentation skills are important, however, going out of your way to please others is what I detest. I feel that if people cannot love, or like you for the person that you are, then you are in the wrong crowd.

I feel that the best approach is being honest, and genuinely expressing these feelings to others. I do not have to suppress the way I feel, or fake the way I feel in order to please other people. The reason for this is that if I am not honest with myself, I cannot be in a good position to understand them. Instead of focusing on what they intend to communicate to me, I will concentrate on how they expect me to respond, and in the end, it will contribute to a miscommunication. I have found that being yourself can be unique, and this is what attracts the right people to you.

To put this into perspective, ever since I was young, I have always loved to read books, novels, and journals. Whenever I was free be it in a bus, at the park, and even in the school cafeteria I would be reading a book. One day as I was reading Lord of the Rings, one of the coolest guys in our school approached me and we started conversating. He told me how he enjoyed reading instead of watching movies, but he initially did not want to do it publicly because he did not want to be labeled as a nerd. However, after seeing me doing it so confidently on a regular basis he wanted, and started doing it. We started sharing books, and I became part of the clique. I was able to win the approval of people because of being myself.