Since I’m part of the Post A Week Challenge on WordPress, I regularly receive emails with topic suggestions for posts. 

Here is Topic #59:

What’s your hidden talent? Also included were these follow-up questions: What is the skill or ability you have people are always surprised to learn you possess? What hidden talent do you wish you had?

Hidden Talent. Powerful words.

I usually read the suggestion and then toss it. But, this one has been really bugging me and so, it’s still hanging out in my inbox. Why?

I’ve been mulling this one over and over. I don’t think I have a hidden talent. Does everyone have one and I missed out?

I can’t sing like Susan Boyle (my kids will attest to that!).

I’m not really that creative or artistic. My artistic claim to fame was drawing elephants on my notebooks in junior high.

I can’t balance a lawnmower on my chin (I saw someone do this on Ellen!).

I don’t really have fashion sense so I can’t design the next “pajama jean”.

I can’t play any musical instrument except maybe the recorder (I bet I can still do Hot Cross Buns). Not really a “talent” since every kid in elementary school can do this.

I can cook, but it’s not hidden.

I can organize anything and anyone to death, but again, not hidden and  not a “talent”.

I can do the daily Indy Star crossword puzzle in about 13 minutes (my personal best). (impressive, right?)

I can fold fitted sheets like nobody’s business (thanks, mom!).

Because I am a TV hound, I can recall obscure actors and actresses names. Not really sure this is all that unique.

 Maybe….

I installed our new kitchen disposal and saved us $600.  Is that a talent?

Seriously, though, I think my 4-year mid-life crisis (4-yr anniversary is this April. You’re wondering about the start date. I’ll get to that.) has been all about finding my hidden talent and I haven’t found it yet.  You’d think after this long, it would have revealed itself by now. Maybe I’m looking too hard.

Okay, the start date of my mid-life crisis?  How can it have a start date? Well, it was the day that I quit my full-time job. When working at this crazy job, I didn’t have time to contemplate my life or what I would be doing down the road. I was just trying to get through the day: wake up, take kids to daycare, work, pick up kids from daycare (and when older, take them to practice of some sort), fix dinner, help with any homework, watch some TV, talk to family, do more work, go to bed….. you get the idea.

When I finally got the time to stop and think about what I really wanted to do (4 yrs ago), I literally locked up. “What the hell am I going to do?” I’d been going 100 mph for so long, I didn’t really have time to find my passion or time to discover my hidden talent (if it’s there).  Yoo hoo, hidden talent, come on out!

Well, I’m still here trying to figure it out. But, in the meantime, I’m still doing insurance (on a part-time basis). Not really the big switch I had fantasized about.

Maybe I need to enter the acceptance stage of this pursuit and come to grips with the fact that I may not have a hidden talent. At least one that I can use to blaze a new path for myself at this point in my life. 

Nah, I’m not completely ready to throw in the towel just yet. The one thought that keeps me focused on my pursuit is that I don’t want to be the old lady in the office that they keep around only because she is the vessel of knowledge of all of those that had gone on before her (you know, the office “tribal elder” that knows how to do everything).

I’ll just have to keep trying and be patient…..