I'm all for egalitarianism in the public sphere, but in private I still believe that there's such a thing as natural born talent.
Anyone can probably reach the top 5% in most non-athletic areas given enough time. But if your goal is to maximize your output having already accepted that your time on earth is limited, then the wise thing is to probably steer in directions that have high impact but for you feel disproportionately easy (compared to the general population).
Thus, I'm a big fan of Peter Theils advice to work on things that satisfy the property that: "if you weren't working on it, this problem would not get solved".
Anyone can probably reach the top 5% in most non-athletic areas given enough time. But if your goal is to maximize your output having already accepted that your time on earth is limited, then the wise thing is to probably steer in directions that have high impact but for you feel disproportionately easy (compared to the general population).
Thus, I'm a big fan of Peter Theils advice to work on things that satisfy the property that: "if you weren't working on it, this problem would not get solved".