Alan’s Abysmal Football Career (Part 2 of 3 of Strengthsfinder 2.0 book review)

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In my last post, I showed how you can find out your top 5 strengths from a list of 34 possibilities, as defined in Strengthsfinder 2.0, by Tom Rath.  Those who read the book can then go to their website, take a test, and find out the skills and attributes in which you not only have a genetic advantage, but should seek to:

1) Improve on even though you’re already good, and

2) Organize your life and work in such a way that you spend more time using these talents instead of trying to improve your weaknesses and become average at everything.

This reminds me of when I played varsity football during my senior of high school.  Man, what a joke.  I remember joining the team with the highest of aspirations and with a work ethic paralleled only by Rudy, the main character of some movie whose name I can’t remember about Rudy in which Rudy overcame all odds to finally play football for Notre Dame.

I practiced hard, I trained hard, I even worked for hours after the team’s official workouts were over and on weekends, improving my catching skills and my time on that damnable yet all-important forty-yard dash.

After all of this hard work, I realized that I was still slow and my improvements were negligible.  I think my time running the forty went from 5.3 seconds down to 5.1, which is pretty bad for a wide receiver.  I realized that football is not like golf, tennis, or even basketball.  You’re either born with the gifts you need to succeed (speed) or you’re not (although gifted people must still work hard to excel over other gifted people).  I did not, and though I tried my best, I sat the bench.

To make this less of a misty-eyed anecdote and more of a case study applicable to your success, let me get to the point.  Let’s pretend that I had applied that aggregious number of hours to something I was already good at, rather than climbing up the wrong ladder:

*  I’ve always been book smart.  Maybe I could have taken evening classes and gotten a year of college finished in advance.

*  Or, I could have, dare I say it, done my high school homework instead, and gotten accepted into a good school as a freshman.

*  I could have started my writing career sooner.

*  I could have started playing the piano sooner.  In fact, if I could trade every hour I spent running up River Road with a backpack full of books for time spent practicing on the piano instead, I’d be the next Liberace by now (minus the flamboyance and penchant for males).

*  Heck, I could have spent the time flipping burgers and would have more to show for it than I did riding the bench.  (Alans math: $5.25/hr busing tables x 327 hours (see football time analysis in footnote 1) = $1,716.75 before taxes)

And don’t give me that “But you built character by learning the value of hard work” rubbish, either.  Growing up, I had always been willing to dedicate an obscene amount of time, effort, relentless persistence, and emotional investment to worthy pursuits I felt passionate about–just ask my Nintendo.

And if you try to mitigate my loss by saying, “But think of the good times you had,” I will again refer you to said Nintendo, with whom I could have had a commensurate amount of good times, without the 2-a-day practices, sprained thumb, and jock itch.

The bottom line is, I spent the equivalent of forty full-time workdays toiling away at one of my weaknesses.  Do not do this.  I may have been an athlete, but I never said I was a role model.  Work on what you are good at instead, and get an employee, partner, technology, or someone else to do what you are not.

You’ll be much happier, will accomplish MUCH more, and will earn more when it’s all said and done, though hopefully more than the $5.25/hr I commanded in 1996.