Whatever it is you like (or love) to do, the fact that you don’t hate it means you probably have the basic tools — and so there’s no reason you can’t get better, maybe a lot better. And so, at the end of the day, there is simply no real excuse for not being great.
Greatness requires dedication and sacrifice, period. Being good at something requires a fair amount… being great requires a huge amount. If you truly desire greatness — or simply to be great at what you do — then much sacrifice is required.
Is it true that talent is overrated? Well, yes. Based on these findings, absolutely. But that doesn’t mean talent plays no role in success. It simply means that having some modicum of talent (whether imparted by genes or favorable early developments) is often a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for success. That lack of sufficiency, i.e. talent alone not being “enough,” or even anywhere close to enough, is an absolutely critical point.
It’s no statistical accident, for example, that the less flashy “work horses” of the baseball and basketball worlds tend to have longer careers than their flashier co-players, thanks to a tighter regime of working hard on the fundamentals to make up for lesser natural gifts.
http://www.mercenarytrader.com/2013/08/getting-on-the-path-to-greatness-talent-is-overrated-review/
