Focus on your strengths and don’t worry about the things you don’t know
(if you don’t want to know them!).
There’s a lot to learn out there. If you actually tried to be a “know-it-all” and be well versed in all the topics that interest you, you’d spend all your time reading books, attending lectures, taking courses, and reading blogs.
Here’s a few topics that I’m fairly well-versed in:
Fitness – weight training, martial arts, strength & conditioning, bodybuilding, running
Health – nutrition, various dietary regimes, digestive issues, pregnancy lifestyle
Psychology – sports psychology, attachment parenting, personal development
Business – marketing, social media, entrepreneurship
Sports – karate, coaching, skiing, scuba diving, swimming, rugby Do I know everything about each of these topics?
Hell’s to the NO!
Those are the areas that interest me the most and the ones that I strive to increase my knowledge in. I don’t even know 0.0001% of what there is to know about what there is to know about those topics, but it’s still more than those people who don’t interest themselves in them.
Here’s a very abridged list of things I know virtually nothing about:
Automobile maintenance, cricket, architecture, astronomy, Middle Eastern history, French cooking, football, submarines, dog training, spina bifida, archery, armed warfare, chess, model planes, North or South Korea, anything that happened in Biblical times, lap band surgery, theoretical physics, Mahjong, knitting, reality TV, etc., etc., etc.
As you can imagine, just trying to keep up with the latest on the topics that interest me is a bit of a challenge. There’s only so much reading time in the day! Now I may one day decide that submarines are quite interesting and I want to learn more about them, but for now I just keep to the topics that bring me greater satisfaction.
Play to your Strengths and Interests
Sure, you want to step outside your comfort zone and do things that you’ve never done before. That’s not what I’m talking about here. Don’t waste your time trying to know everything about everything and focus on being well versed in the things that interest you and mean the most to you.
In your career, that means developing a niche and staying in that zone most of the time. Stretch yourself on occasion, but don’t worry about not keeping up with everything. If I worried about how much I don’t know about the North/South Korea situation I’d be a mess. It’s good to have some basic awareness of many things so you know what’s happening in the world, but don’t fret if you have gaps in your knowledge. Ask someone that specializes in the area to fill you in and then don’t worry about what you’re missing.
Use Your Time Wisely
Yes, I could learn all about car maintenance by spending hours studying, practicing, or taking a course.
Is that really the best use of my time if it doesn’t interest me?
Not really.
There are people out there – car mechanics – who have spent years learning and practicing their trade. If I try to replicate their efforts I’ll only cause myself unnecessary anxiety and waste time that I could spend on learning the things that interest me. I call in professionals when I want something done well. I don’t struggle through the process of learning and trying to do something that doesn’t interest me.
One day I do want to learn to play chess so I’ll make an effort to do that. As for the other stuff, I won’t bother to learn about most of it. Oh, and I don’t know how to clean my house very well either. That’s why I’ve hired a cleaner.
Now I have more time to blog.
Ivana Chapman
