Easing up on your Weaknesses is a Sign of Strength

Sweat is pouring out of every pore of my body while I sprint full speed at another human being. I lower my shoulder, and it connects with the middle of his chest. Too high. Even though he falls to the ground, the impact also takes a toll on me. I get up, adjust my helmet, and get back to the huddle of my team. American Football is a brutal sport. It’s the playoffs. You win, your season stays alive. You lose, it’s all over. No one cares how many games you’ve won. The playoffs are do-or-die time.

I’m a linebacker, so my job is to run into other human beings with full throttle without thinking about it twice. I absolutely love it. Probably because I’m competitive. It also might be because of early-twenties anger issues. Who knows.

I line up for the next play. My opponent is much taller and heavier than I am. I have to be stronger, faster, or smarter. In a few seconds, I'm going to find out that for this play, I'm none of the above.

In a practice before, my coach encouraged me to use a so-called “swim move” more often. A swim move consists of slapping your opponent’s arms away, then grabbing him by the shoulder with one arm while simultaneously lifting the other arm above the shoulder. This enables you to get around the blocker. Swim moves are favored by tall players with long arms, such as defensive ends and the sort. The problem is that I’m neither tall nor do I have long arms. But I trust my coach.

The play starts. I stay low, but to perform a swim move, I have to stand more upright. With a straight upper body, I lift my arm up - and open palms strike me in the chest so hard that I almost lose my breath. I get elevated, and instead of green grass, I see the blue sky. While in midair, I ready myself for the impact while also evaluating my life choices. I hit the ground with a thump, the air gets catapulted out of my lungs, and shame enters every cell of my body. I experienced the worst fear of every football player: I just got pancaked. It’s not just exciting for the opponent when you get pancaked. It’s also great fun for all your teammates, because now they can remind you for the rest of the season that somebody took part of your soul back home with them.

Now, here’s the fatal flaw with my use-the-swim-move-tactic: every single thing about my body type screams to not use this move. I’m not very tall, but this allows me to dip under my opponent. This makes me hard to block. But if I lift my arm up and try to perform the move that lets my opponent turn me into a human airplane, I destroy this natural advantage because I give up all the leverage I have.

I don’t enjoy swim moves. I’m not good at them. Then why would I focus scarce time and energy on it? And why am I explaining American Football techniques to you?

Because it’s a great example of what I see happening every day: People focusing on skills they don’t like and are not good at just because somebody told them to become good at them, otherwise they would fail in life.

Learning new skills has to do with resource allocation. Your amount of energy and time are limited. But learning new skills requires an investment of both. If your talent is higher in a particular skill, you will become better much quicker.

Also, most underestimate one crucial factor: interest. In my opinion, it’s even more important than talent. When you set out to learn a new skill, the beginning feels like a breeze, because you’re motivated. But this motivation quickly fades. This is a problem if you pursue a skill for extrinsic reasons. Extrinsic motivation will not get you through the dark of night when you don’t feel like working on the skill. It will require an enormous amount of discipline, and discipline is also a finite resource. The more willpower something requires, the more energy it will deplete.

Having interest in something is like flying with a Jetstream in your back. With the same amount of fuel, you get much further. Of course, sometimes you have to learn things you don’t enjoy because they’re important. Just because you don’t like cooking doesn’t mean you shouldn’t learn how to prepare a nice meal. But when it comes to professional or hobbyist skills, it’s open season, baby.

My one-way mentor Naval Ravikant (he doesn’t know he holds this prestigious role) said in a podcast that after you’ve acquired the basics of some skill, you have to go out on your own. The path to mastery is for you to discover. If you do things the way they’ve been done before, then it’s foolish to expect different results.

Don’t listen to someone who tells you that you first must strengthen your weaknesses. Focus on your strengths and interests instead. The Return on Investment will be so much greater. But most of all, you will enjoy your life much more.

Don’t make yourself weak, focus on your strengths.