Effort

Now, you see, the inevitable conclusion of our discussion is: It depends on what subject you have the so-called interest, or, in other words, you are prepared to infuse your sweat and enthusiasm.

But, once we talk about putting up painstaking effort in doing something, there are in theory three kinds of people:

1. Some are born to be hardworking (if not obsessive) - they would be successful whatever they choose.
2. Some have enthusiasm concentrated in the Broca's area, hypertrophy in the pain fibers, degeneration of the motor cortex, and intermittent flights of idea; I shall not elaborate on their future.
3. Some are obsessive and hardworking in one particular area but not others; they would do well only when choosing a job they are interested in.

That sounds simple, right ? The leg-pulling bit is: very few people are truly category #3.

This is because hardworking and obsessiveness represent one human character on their own - independent on the area of personal interest, and most of us fall somewhere between the continuum of category #1 and #2.

The problematic observation is, however, hardworking and successful people often tell their followers that they are interested in the subject that they work on - without realizing the fact that they would be equally successful (and have the same degree of interest) if they chose an entirely different thing from the beginning. Just consider my friends: KM could be an equally eminent neurologist, JW a surgeon, or VW a musician, if they made slightly different decisions years ago.

(Alas, for the third scenario, you may consider that a great loss to our liver patients - but that would not be a loss to VW himself.)

PS. The last part of this series is not my invention. I derive it from the classic text of Daniel Goleman - Emotional Intelligence.