“If you’re not a genius, don’t bother.”
Jim Bennett is easily the most depressing English literature professor the world has ever seen. After a long rant about the unequal distribution of talent and how “desiring a thing cannot make you have it,” however, something interesting happens in his classroom.
He calls out Dexter, who’s disinterested in the conversation, sitting way back.
“Dexter! An ordinary-looking young man with a what? Size 40 jacket, regular features, and decent dentition, is the second-ranked collegiate tennis player in the United States of America. How did that come about, Dexter? You come from a tennis family?”
“I mean, uhh, I started playing five years ago in high school ’cause the tennis guys have the best weed.”
Great. A pothead who’s a tennis prodigy. As if Bennett’s point wasn’t easy enough to make. But, when he continues to dig…
“After you started tennis, how long was it before you were better than everybody?”
“Before I was better than everybody, or before I knew it?”
“What happened when you noticed you were naturally better than everybody?”
“I…I got interested in the game.”
Then, Bennett launches into yet another speech about the Machiavellian nature of ambition, but it’s Dexter’s last line that really stands out: Even the biggest talent can’t bend all the rules of the game. Before he can win, he must start playing. And not just play, but play until he can notice he’s exceeding.
For all his witty lines, on one account, Jim Bennett is totally, utterly wrong:
You don’t have to be a genius to recognize you’re good at something.
Chances are, you’ll have to play more than a couple matches, write more than a few blog posts, or practice more than three songs. Probably thousands. But eventually, you’ll feel you’re getting the hang of it. Once you do, the pain of not doing your thing quickly becomes bigger than the pain of doing it. That’s what we call passion.
And, unlike Dexter, who’s stuck with one talent he might not even like, we’re free to choose what we commit ourselves to. Until we bother. After that, there’s no turning back. This is why people like us — the people Jim Bennett would call losers — will one day rule the world.