The secret talents within each of us

"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes."
- Horace, Roman lyric poet said to have influenced English poetry (65-8 BC)

An important lesson in life is to ignore most of the sayings about "the greatest" of anything. They never are, but they manage to get attention for the speaker/writer at the time.

Fools are right sometimes. Not because they are fools or because the odds favour everyone being right at least some of the time.

Fools (in the case of Horace who live two millennia ago) , what we might call people of lower intelligence today, also have intelligence. In many cases, a person considered to have low intelligence may be as good as anyone in his community (maybe better) at some things. These are not savants, but simple folk.

The human brain is complex. While it may not work well for some people to function at the level of a majority of people in many aspects of life, it may be superior in some respects.

We would do well to find what is superior in the minds and bodies of each person we know and encourage them to make good use of these talents. The Special Olympics is one example of what apparently unequal people can accomplish.

Every one of us can excel at something. We have trouble finding that for ourselves, but not so much finding it in others. If we help each other, we all get better.

Bill Allin
'Turning It Around: Causes and Cures for Today's Epidemic Social Problems,' striving to stress the talents and skills of those less privileged.
Learn more at http://billallin.com/cgi/index.pl