Everything I write comes down to one thing: replacing default with intention. Default is what you do without choosing it, repeating what was done before or what others do. Intention is consciously committing to a direction. Each piece approaches it from a different angle, and together they build toward an authentic, happy and meaningful life.

In my last piece, I wrote about getting to know what comes naturally to you. Understanding your character strengths can show you when you feel most yourself, what you bring to others, and where you might find meaning in ordinary life.

For me, that understanding is part of learning to live in accordance with your path. I believe a direction can also be given to you, through paying attention and surrendering to what life brings. Your strengths can help you recognize and respond to it.

But knowing what comes naturally can raise another question. What about the things that do not? If something matters to you, but you are not immediately good at it, what does that tell you? And how much room is there to grow when other people seem to begin so much further ahead?

When a description becomes a limit
Many of us grow up with an idea of talent as something you either have or do not. You are a numbers person, a creative person, a natural leader. Or you are not.

These descriptions can become a default too. We absorb them from parents, teachers, comparisons with others, or an experience that did not go well. Over time, "I found this difficult" becomes "This is not who I am." We stop exploring before we have had much chance to learn.

The same can happen with a strengths profile. Recognizing that kindness or curiosity comes naturally can be useful. Treating a lower-ranked strength as something unavailable to you turns that insight into a restriction.

Character strengths and talents are different things. A talent is an aptitude for something, such as music or mathematics. Character strengths are qualities such as kindness, curiosity and perseverance that you bring to how you live. Both can be developed, although people differ in how easily they learn and in the opportunities they have to do so.

Regardless, knowing yourself should always leave room for discovering more of yourself.

What the belief in natural brilliance can do
These beliefs also exist in the environments around us. A study across thirty academic disciplines found that fields placing greater emphasis on innate brilliance had fewer women earning PhDs. The researchers found a similar pattern for African Americans. This was an association, rather than proof that the belief caused those differences, but it raises a question about whom a field encourages to feel they belong.

If we associate ability with a particular kind of person, we may overlook it in someone else. And when being good at something is supposed to look effortless, difficulty can start to feel like evidence that we do not belong.

That matters when we are trying to recognize our path. We may dismiss a possibility because we have absorbed an idea about who is entitled to pursue it.

What comes easily still needs attention
In a Harvard course I took on Chinese philosophy, an observation stayed with me: being gifted can sometimes make it easier to stop practicing. When something already comes easily, you may have less reason to work at it. While someone who initially struggles has to learn how to improve through practice, trying different approaches and asking for help. As they begin to see progress, they learn that their effort makes a difference. That can encourage them to keep developing, and eventually go further than someone who relies on their natural advantage.

Having a natural talent may give you a head start, depending on your circumstances and the course your life takes. But finding something difficult at first does not tell you how far you could go with practice and the right support.

Think back to Butcher Ding, whom I wrote about in my piece on not needing the whole picture to begin. In Zhuangzi's story, his extraordinary ease develops through years of practice and attention. He learns to sense the structure of what he is working with and to respond to it. The apparent effortlessness has a history.

For me, that connects practice with surrender. Through becoming more attentive, we can learn to work with a situation and respond to what it asks of us.

Research on deliberate practice offers a useful qualification. Structured practice aimed at improving performance accounts for part of the differences between people, with its contribution varying considerably across activities. It matters, but it does not explain everything. Nor does everything left unexplained automatically amount to innate talent.

We can take development seriously while recognizing that not everyone will reach the same place through the same amount of effort.

Giving yourself a chance to learn
How we understand difficulty can affect what we do with it. Psychologist Carol Dweck calls the belief that abilities can develop a growth mindset.

In one study, students who saw intelligence as developable paid more sustained attention to information that could help them correct their mistakes. They also corrected more errors on a later test than students who viewed intelligence as fixed.

For me, the useful question goes beyond performance on a test. If something feels worth exploring, can I give myself a chance to learn, rather than treating my current abilities as the limit?

This connects to the willpower circle of my manifesting model. If every difficulty feels like confirmation that you are not capable, it can become harder to keep going. Seeing it as part of learning gives you something to work with. You can bring your attention back to the practice: understanding something better, trying a different approach or asking for help.

And that attention matters. Your life is happening now, not in an imagined future. So when it comes to the process and the end result: if this is what feels right to give yourself to now, finding meaning and satisfaction in doing it is living your path. That does not mean every attempt has to feel enjoyable or be successful. It means giving yourself fully to the practice, without making its meaning depend on a future result you cannot control.

In my piece on fear and hope, I mentioned research in which hope predicted academic results even after accounting for intelligence, personality and previous grades. The hope studied there includes seeing possible ways forward and believing you can act on them. That is relevant here too: when one approach does not work, being able to imagine another can help you maintain your willpower and continue.

The point is not that enough willpower will make every pursuit right for you. It is that finding something difficult at first, or seeing others be more 'talented' in something, does not have to close the door. If an interest or opportunity feels worth exploring, you can give yourself time to discover what becomes possible through practice and support.

None of this requires turning your life into an exercise in constant improvement. Developing your abilities is about giving yourself room to respond to what feels meaningful and what your path may ask of you. The point remains living an authentic, happy and meaningful life.

Circumstances belong in this conversation
Any honest discussion of growth also has to include circumstances. People have different access to safety, time, money, education, encouragement and care. Discrimination can affect whose abilities are recognized and whose opportunities are restricted.

Research using income records from more than forty million children and their parents found substantial differences in upward economic mobility across areas of the United States. Where someone starts is part of the story of what becomes possible for them.

A program I followed on diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging and justice at UC Berkeley brought this into focus too: looking only at individual effort can hide the conditions in which that effort takes place.

This matters especially in writing about manifesting. If we suggest that people simply create whatever happens to them, we can turn suffering into a personal failure. As if someone facing poverty, illness or exclusion lacked the right intention or did not want change enough.

That is far from how I understand it. Difficult circumstances do not mean that growth or living in accordance with your path is no longer possible. They can make it much harder, and the opportunities and support available to you matter. Intention and will can help us respond within the room we have. But sometimes that room is very small, and support from others is what makes the next step possible.

Note that serving the common good includes making more room for others.

Staying open to your path
In my manifesting model, strengths sit alongside willpower and an intention that serves something beyond yourself. Knowing your strengths helps you recognize what you bring. Willpower helps you practice and follow through. Intention connects those actions to what they serve, while surrender leaves room for life to unfold.

I believe that also means allowing your understanding of your path to change. Something may come through a person you meet, an opportunity you did not plan, or an interest you keep returning to. You may need to learn something before you can respond fully to it.

Difficulty alone does not tell you that a direction is wrong for you. Ease alone does not tell you that it is yours. What comes naturally is useful information, and so is what you discover through paying attention, practicing and living.

You do not have to know in advance everything you could become in order to meet what is being offered now.

It comes down to this: get to know yourself and what comes naturally to you. Do the work that feels right to give yourself to, including learning what does not yet come easily. Trust that you do not need to see the whole picture to take the next step. Remain open to what life brings, and trust and surrender to how it will unfold. Your starting point is not the whole story, and you do not have to know the ending to live your path now.

Quoting Michael Singer: "You do not know what kind of story it was until it ends".

In practice

• Notice a label you use about yourself: "I am not creative," "I am bad with people," or "I could never do that." What experiences is it based on? What have you not yet had the chance to learn?

• Choose one small opportunity or interest you have dismissed because it did not come easily. If it still feels worth exploring, give yourself a chance to be a beginner. Ask what kind of practice, guidance or support would help.

• When something goes wrong, look for information you can use. What happened? What could you try differently? Whose help could you ask for?

• Name a circumstance that restricts you, without treating it as a personal failure. Consider what you can influence, what support you need, and what would require change beyond you.

This is the question I want to carry into the next piece, which is about purpose: as I come to understand myself and pay attention to what life brings, what am I being called to serve?

Chetty, R., Hendren, N., Kline, P. and Saez, E. (2014).
Day, L., Hanson, K., Maltby, J., Proctor, C. and Wood, A. (2010).
Dweck, C. S. (2006).
Leslie, S.-J., Cimpian, A., Meyer, M. and Freeland, E. (2015).
Macnamara, B. N., Hambrick, D. Z. and Oswald, F. L. (2014).
Mangels, J. A., Butterfield, B., Lamb, J., Good, C. and Dweck, C. S. (2006).
Singer, M. A.
Zhuangzi. Nourishing the Lord of Life, chapter 3.