When Max was 10 years old he asked his Uncle Jason to teach him how to play the piano.
He quit after five minutes.
Looking back Max realized that he didn’t want to “learn” how to play the guitar… he just wanted to “play” the guitar.
The Perfectionist continues to be the most obvious and familiar of my five competence types, often described as the five Types of Impostor Syndrome.
But that’s not what was happening here.
The expectation that he should be able to quickly and easily pick up the guitar suggests the early beginnings of a way of thinking about competence I refer to as the Natural Genius.
Are You a “Natural Genius”?
According to Webster’s dictionary, competence means “having the capacity to function or develop in a particular way.” The operative words here are “capacity” and “develop.”
Unfortunately, no one told that to the Natural Genius.
To be clear: It’s not that you are a genius or you think you are.
Rather, for you true competence means having inherent intelligence and ability.
Since intelligence and ability are seen as innate, the thinking here is that success should be effortless.
If you identify with the Natural Genius, what you care about most is how and when accomplishments happen.
Like the Perfectionist, the Natural Genius has set the internal bar impossibly high.
But instead of the key measure being flawlessness, you judge yourself based on ease and speed.
You expect to know without being taught, to excel without effort, and to get it right on the first attempt.
You think, “If I were really smart, I would be able to understand everything the first time I hear it.”
Or, “If I were a real writer, it wouldn’t be this hard.”
Or, in my case, “If I had a gift for music I should be able to just ‘play’ the guitar.”
When you’re not able to do something quickly or fluently, your impostor alarm goes off.
The reason Natural Geniuses want to go from novice to expert without having to suffer the in-between stages is not because they’re lazy.
It’s because they don’t even realize that an in-between stage exists.
You look at people who are at the top of their field, and it all looks so effortless.
So as a new job hire you expect yourself to hit the ground running.
As a student, you believe you should have emerged from the womb knowing how to do advanced calculus or write a dissertation.
You start a business and expect to earn a profit on day one.
When learning how to play an instrument or master a sophisticated procedure, you expect to pick everything up right away.
Because you believe a more competent person would be further along by now, when you do run up against something that is not easily understood, that’s difficult or time-consuming to master, you think, “It must be me.”
This thinking is reinforced by a culture that has lost the notion of apprenticeship, one that reveres talent over effort and overnight success over slow, steady progress.
Competence Reframes for the Natural Genius
A major reframe for the Natural Genius involves the recognition that innate talent has remarkably little to do with greatness.
Not only can you learn how to do any number of things, you can even become great at them—if you’re willing to work at it.
There are plenty of examples from the world of sports and art of people who started out with only average abilities but were willing to persevere and wound up doing as well as, and often better than, those who are naturally gifted but fail to apply themselves.
For an especially inspiring example of the power of effort, check out this short video about a then unknown basketball player named Stephen Curry
The good news is that effort is available to anyone willing to use it — and that includes you.
With practice, you get better, and when you get better, you feel better. Best of all, you’ll have the hard-won confidence to prove it.
Will you encounter setbacks along the way? Bet on it.
The difference is that instead of seeing difficulty and challenge as signs of your ineptness, you now approach them as opportunities to grow and learn.
Here’s where the power of reframing comes in.
Instead of thinking, “I’m unqualified”, think, “I may be inexperienced but I’m fully capable of growing into the role.”
Instead of thinking, “Yikes, I have no idea what I’m doing!” tell yourself, “Wow, I’m really going to learn a lot.”
Words really do matter. Simply changing how you talk to yourself about a difficulty or a challenge changes how you approach it.
In a recent CBS Sunday Morning interview, the family of Henry Mancini said it took the great composer a month just to create the first three notes to Moon River.
Michelangelo said, “Genius is eternal patience.”
Writing a dissertation, building a practice, or doing anything of consequence takes considerable time, effort, and patience.
Remember that your first draft, first presentation, first painting, or first anything is never going to be as good as your second — or your two hundredth.
Swap your false notions of overnight success for the ideal slow, steady progress, coupled with effort and you’ll discover the true meaning of genius.
When you do, you will be well on your way to “unlearning” impostor syndrome by learning to think like a Humble Realist™.
