What Determines Success Between Ability And Effort?

A lot of people think that success is specifically reserved for the people who are naturally gifted or talented. That is, those who are born with extraordinary ability. It is true that your talent and your gift can give you a head start in life, but it will not ultimately determine your success. In reality, the efforts you put in will be what will eventually bring the kind of success you want, and may even far outweigh your ability. Many people are talented in many ways, but it feels like not every of them is achieving the same level of success. The reason is simple, success is basically determined by the actions and efforts that you have put into your ability, not just the ability alone.

While in school, there was this friend of mine who was not too good in mathematics. In fact, he struggled to achieve an average result. Then there was another guy who was so talented in maths that he would not even do much but he would see himself scaling through. What my friend did, with our help, was to begin to study maths extensively. He asked questions, got books, past questions, and other materials, and kept himself busy with maths. Over time, his grades started to pick up and he was happy about it. He did not relax but kept putting in efforts. When we wrote our final exam, adorably, this guy did excellently well, even better than the other guy who just relied on his natural talent without reading much. This shows the potency of efforts to bring about success.

Just to let you know; ability is what you are capable of doing at the moment. It can come from your natural talent, or from your environment, or even from early exposure. There are some people that naturally learn faster, quickly understand concepts, and even perform certain tasks easier than some other people. However, even though your ability alone can give you a start, but it may not take you far. If you do not add efforts to it, it will remain just as potential and untapped resources. Imagine having something and not using it, how will you get the benefit that comes from having it in the first place?

When you put efforts, you generate energy to improve on yourself. Efforts is the willingness to keep taking steps even if the result is not what you expected. Even if you fail, you learn and try again, and keep going. No one will hand over the result you need to you simply because you are talented, you have to earn it. It is actually your efforts that will transform your ability into real skills. A lot of the people that actually achieve extraordinary results just found a way to put actions into their ability. With the right amount of efforts, you can achieve the extraordinary even with an average ability.

Someone who has a high ability but with a low effort can start strong, but along the line, they may just begin to move sideways. This is because they may just heavily depend on only what lies within them, and they avoid challenges that can lead to personal growth. Over time, they can lose the determination to even continue. But someone else who has an average ability but who consistently and constantly puts in efforts, and sees reasons to continue doing so, will eventually outshines the one with high ability and less effort. This is because the person who constantly puts efforts will become better, improve, learn from their mistakes, and adapt to new trends.

It is worthy to note that efforts also have ways of building resilience, discipline, and experience. You cannot get these questions by ability only. When you put efforts, you will develop the habit of persistence and perseverance. You will also learn how to handle setbacks and keep moving forward. Which will become important for you in the long-term. The people who achieve success do not rely just on their ability, talents, or gifts alone, but they always put extensive work and efforts even when things get difficult. At the end of the day, no one will reward you because of how talented you are, but the reward comes from the result you have, which is a function of the efforts you put in.

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