This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Columbia Barnard chapter.
“Natural talent” is like the white peacock in a Toni Morrison novel (Song of Solomon, to be specific). It’s a blind infatuation with opulent vanity that can only foreshadow disappointment. This sounds unfounded and I will say that this is literally the ONLY thing I remember from my high school English Literature career (save the one time my sophomore English teacher said everything comes back to sex), but bear with me.
I don’t believe skill is predicated on anything inherently natural. I’m speaking from a lifetime of being told that I was good at gymnastics because I was short; that I am good at origami because I’m Chinese; or that I’m bad at driving because I’m an Asian woman (LOL, GTFO).
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I can’t believe that mastery comes naturally. If I accept that my aptitude and limitations are intrinsically tied to my physicality or another superficiality, I probably would probably be the same insecure girl who balked at majoring in International Relations because she thought she would be too dumb to be taken seriously. But nobody is impervious to growth or change. That being said, I do get more enjoyment out of activities if I am good at them so I tend to stick to my strengths. This year, however, I am making a substantial effort to try new things so I joined the Columbia Ski Team and the Argentine Tango Club.
With a background in gymnastics and dance, I was sure that I would sure be able to master the basics and stand out as an “advanced” novice– I was sure that things would just come naturally. And there’s the white peacock, the unattainable desire to be this sparkling, hard diamond (catch that Death of a Salesman reference? I’m killing these high school throwbacks), to be brilliant, to be an all star all-around, but most importantly, to do so with ease. This is the impossible pursuit, to be effortlessly and instantly master anything you set out to do.
Needless to say, I quickly learned that I am not a ski or tango prodigy. Moreover, the thing I feared most happened: I looked like a straight up fool in front of other people. I’m sure one or two of my dancing partners thought I was a total ditz with no sense of rhythm (right back at ya, boys). While the ski lift full of people were probably relieved that I didn’t break anything after wiping out hardcore three times in a row, they probably hold my athletic abilities in low esteem. But at the end of the day, I had fun, so who cares?
If these activities were academic rather than recreational perhaps I would not be so relaxed and accepting of my shortcomings. Like many students here at Barnard, I want to excel at what I do– at everything¬ that I do, especially schoolwork. In class I expect to present myself as this infallible intellectual for whom any misunderstanding is a deficiency. But the times I literally fell on my ass while skiing or called out for doing something wrong while tangoing I didn’t perceive my lack of skills as shortcomings, rather it was probably a necessary failure I needed to realize how ridiculous and hindering my expectations were for my self esteem and personal growth. Particularly with schoolwork, I get impatient when things don’t immediately click and my frustration can segue into unhealthy thoughts that seldom result in productivity.
It’s daunting to think about where I want to be compared to where I am now, but in order to clearly make a path for myself, I have to accept and understand that I will make mistakes along the way.
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