Do it ‘Cuz it’s NOT a Talent.

My family and I are taking inventory. We’ve been making a list of each our talents and gifts. As some of you know, I’m the king, Debbie is the queen and Nick (age 4) is the prince (more on that story later). As king of the family I thought it would be a good idea to take an inventory of talents to see what resources we can allocate. I suggested that you can claim a talent at any stage of its development. So far, I have 11, Debbie has 11 and Nick has 22. Debbie has always said that Nick is so smart we may have picked up the wrong kid at the hospital.

So a point came up in our last family meeting. I asked, “If we get a dog, who will scoop the poop at the park?” After all, the rule is to scoop. I said, “If it’s someone’s talent, that certain someone should do it.” I’ve always thought if you have a talent you should develop it. Special note: on the list of talents so far, Debbie is the only one whose talent is “cleaning up.” Now I thought, “If it’s a talent, you should use it and inversely, if it’s not a talent of mine, I shouldn’t have to do it.” But I find out right away in our meeting that no one in our family wants to scoop. Well that got me thinking. So I asked Nick to see if he had a talent we hadn’t discovered yet. He said it wasn’t on his list either. Furthermore, Debbie said she wasn’t fully buying my conclusion that “if it’s not a talent, you shouldn’t have to do it.” She reasoned, “If picking up after yourself isn’t your talent, that would mean you shouldn’t pick up. But I think if it isn’t a talent of yours, you should do it until it becomes one. You should develop new talents.”

I must confess that when Nick mentioned that Debbie is good at brushing her teeth, going potty and showering I was the one that characterized Debbie’s talent as “good at cleaning up.” She corrected me and called it “personal cleaning.” This probably explains why “looking good” and “smelling good” are on her list too. I wasn’t too surprised that she came at this whole issue from an opposite angle. It’s kind of a ying-yang thing we’ve got going. Well that got me thinking again.

I asked around to see if anyone in the family had ever scooped poop before. Nick said, “I’ve never picked up any animal’s poop before.” And It turns out I’m the only one who has experience scooping. I had done it as a kid long ago. I realized it’s an old talent of mine after all. So now I’m putting it on my list in hope that someone besides me will want to develop that talent. Stay tuned to see if Debbie, Nick or the dog decides to learn a new trick.

©2004 Paul Esch. All Rights Reserved. Paul Esch is President of Breakthrough Business Success, Inc. He works with business owners to improve vital sales, marketing and management systems. To publish this please call 651-501-7979.