Expert Interview: The Power of Knowing Your Talent Early in Life

Dr. Thomas Tavantzis

Following the dictum, “Know thyself,”—inscribed by his distant Greek ancestors over the entry to Delphi in Athens—Dr. Tom Tavantzis has been helping people know themselves. From the early 1970s through his work today, he has worked with people from ages 15 to 60, to help them discover their talents, develop and maximize them, while increasing their satisfaction in life and career and being useful to others.

The Power of Knowing Your Talent Early in Life –Through High School, College and Beyond, with Dr. Tom Tavantzis

One thing to understand about talents is that we all have them. We need to figure out what they are. Talents are going to evolve, but they are not going to change significantly over time. A recent study from New Zealand of 1,000 children, who were followed over a 23-year period—and that’s a good longitudinal study! Researchers observed that a child’s personality at age three was remarkably consistent with the personality traits observed when the child reached age 26.

Why Is This Important?

“You want to understand how you think, how you make decisions. What role in life should you seek out? As a high school or college student, knowing your talent can help you find your best way of learning. Or, even more importantly, it will help you make an informed decision about the best place for you to go to college and what kind of environment should you seek out. Having a knowledge of your abilities and values, and building on that understanding can start early in life. Over time, you can discover what your family of origin communicated to you about the world. Having some sort of structured program—such as the Highlands Ability Battery—helps you think through who you are. Knowing who you are will help you look clearly at your best options.”

What Are the Key Lessons Learned Here?

“There is an illusion that there’s an ‘expert answer’ that will come from some testing instrument. But that’s not the case. What is the case is that there are at least eight factors, that we know pretty reliably, that help us explore our options in a structured way so we can better navigate the world we live in, a world which is very complex and rapidly changing. It’s important to know your interests and your passions, but the idea that you should just follow your passion is not sufficient. It’s a good thing to know, but it’s not enough just to be excited.”