Since childhood we’re often told that if we study and work really-really hard, we’ll succeed in everything we do. But is that so? Is discipline and being organized more important than being talented? I’m pretty sure that a majority of people will give a positive answer to this. However there are some nuances I’d like to talk about.

I do believe that in order to get better at what you do you need to work on yourself and sharpen your skills. You can’t rely merely on your inborn abilities cause in most cases they won’t take you far on their own. And I do think that in mechanical, scientific or athletic fields hard-working can often be more crucial than talent. But whenever it comes to art and creative sphere, I strongly disagree with this statement. Let me explain.

I believe that art comes from our souls. It’s about capturing and transferring all those intangible things in life, like the beauty we see around, the emotions we feel, the thoughts we have. Some do it in a form of music, others – via writing or painting. These ideas come alive not from our brains, but from our hearts. It’s like our muses whisper the words or notes that later become a part of one big work. Everything I described can be defined in a single word – talent. At least that’s how I see it.

Years and centuries ago, when being a creator (I’ll use this word to combine writers, artists and musicians) wasn’t that prestigious and profitable, only people with real talent dedicated their lives to the process of creation because that was their destiny. If you’ve studied the biographies of famous people, you’ll know that lots of them didn’t live very well. They received some fees from one “project” and proceeded to create another one, which could take long months and years. No one else, except true creators, could live like that. Others would prefer to become doctors, lawyers or merchants in order to have regular and higher income.

Now times have changed. Saying that you are a creator immediately makes you look intelligent and luxurious. Not to mention the amount of money and fame most artists now receive. It has become the new mainstream dream job – to become a singer, a blogger, a writer, a designer. But the thing is that you need to have a talent for that. And let’s face it, not everyone has it, even if they succeed in their field somehow.

That’s when hard-work comes to the rescue. A singer, who doesn’t have a good voice, starts the never-ending practices and vocal lessons with professionals in order to become slightly better. A writer, who doesn’t have the right skills, keeps writing crappy work and hires lots of editors and ghostwriters in order to help them make their work presentable.

And now there are thousands of authors and books that get published and sold in stores, millions of artists who produce music, lots of artists whose work you see in modern galleries. But let’s be honest and confess that nowadays’ creators mostly produce low-quality mediocre content that has no impact or whatsoever on us. We finish a book and realize that it didn’t inspire us, didn’t give or teach us anything. We listen to a song and can’t even remember its lyrics or music afterwards. We watch a movie and completely forget its plot after a while.

Why does it happen, you’ll ask. Because all that work was created by hard-work and not their talent; by brains, not hearts. That’s why it doesn’t touch our souls cause it didn’t come from there in the first place. It’s just a bunch of words and passages that are grammatically correct, are beautiful and elegant but are empty inside. Like a beautiful frame without the painting inside. Like a fancy wrapper with an awful tasting candy.

I think there’s no need to talk about the greatness of classic works. They have become literal masterpieces that we love, respect and relate to even now, when the times have changed so dramatically. Just think about it, some of the best books, music, paintings were created a few hundred years ago, but we still thoroughly enjoy it. We buy those novels, we go to concerts of classical music and visit museums to see the creations of Van Gogh or Da Vinci. That’s how powerful these works are. And they will be for a long time.

Have you ever wondered why these old works have more impact on us than the things created by our peers? The answer’s simple: they were created by natural talent, not by discipline. Those artists had something to share, it was their life destiny, that’s why they did it so masterfully well even without the proper training that is so valuable today. Sometimes we can’t really explain why a certain work is so great, but we feel it to be so, our souls know the difference. The difference between a true talent and a fake.

Now, a few clarifications I have to make. Firstly, I don’t think that there are no good modern artists. There are, plenty of them. But if you compare percentage-wise, you’ll see the difference. Secondly, I don’t say that discipline isn’t necessary, or that the creators of the past weren’t hard-working enough. Of course they were. But their genius and talent absolutely outweighed their organizational skills. Cause that’s how it should be when it comes to art.