What am I good at? 10 ways to get there

If you’re questioning how to figure out what you’re good at, you may be feeling stuck. Maybe your job or career isn’t as fulfilling as you’d hoped, or you lack a sense of purpose. If it seems like your skills and strengths are being underutilized or you’re finding your normal activities draining, you don’t have to continue that way.

Learning how to find what you are good at helps you discover your unique talents and areas of expertise. Once you know these things about yourself, it can be easier to find a job and the best hobbies that make you naturally feel more in your element. When you identify your strengths and talents, pursuing roles or activities that prioritize those characteristics can help increase your motivation and interest in what you’re doing, leading to greater fulfillment.

It can be difficult to see past doubts and truly realize where you excel. But everyone is good at something, whether or not you currently believe that to be true. You just need to find your match. Discovering and leveraging your natural strengths can determine your next steps and help you meet your goals.

How to figure out what you’re good at

Understanding your strengths is crucial for personal and professional development. It not only boosts confidence but also guides you toward fulfilling career paths and life choices.

To help you start this self-discovery process, try the following 10 things to learn how to figure out what you are good at.

Reflect on your skills

Everyone has a set of hard skills and soft skills. Hard skills refer to technical or analytical skills and specific talents, like knowing how to code or speak a specific language. Soft skills are nontechnical skills that relate to how you interact with others. These may include strong communication skills, patience, and active listening.

Reflect on your education and work history, including volunteer roles and internships. Consider what you did and didn’t enjoy during those experiences, what made you feel the most accomplished, and any feedback you received on your job performance. Finding the common thread will teach you more about your innate skills and help you better understand how to figure out what you’re good at.

Ask your friends and family

It can be hard to analyze yourself objectively. Reach out to trusted friends, family members, or colleagues and ask them to share what they perceive as your strengths. External perspectives can often highlight talents you may overlook. Those who know and respect you can provide honest feedback about what you’re good at that you may have never considered. 

Use conversation starters like the following to ask for answers that can help you learn how to figure out what you’re good at: 

• What do you see as my strengths?
• What do you think are my most unique skills or personality traits?
• Do you think I’m using my abilities to the fullest extent?
• Do you think my career and hobbies contribute to my life’s purpose or calling?

Try new things

If you don’t go outside your comfort zone and take chances, you’ll have no way to start learning, growing, and excelling. You may have hidden talents, strengths, and skills that could end up fueling your purpose or passion.

Try traveling, taking interesting classes, and making new friends to expand your horizons. Experience different cultures, put yourself in others’ shoes, and explore various types of professional roles and responsibilities. You’ll never know what you love to do until you try.

Consider your personality type

Your personality can affect your strengths in a lot of ways. It can impact the way you learn, how you acquire new skills, and the way you do your job. It can also influence what you do and what you don’t feel comfortable doing in your career.

For example, extroverts may be better at giving good work presentations than introverts because they’re energized when surrounded by people. Meanwhile, optimists may perform better at their jobs than those with a negative mindset because they tend to have lower stress levels, which can lead them to be more productive and focused. 

Take an assessment

Aptitude and personality tests are designed to help you narrow down your top skills and discover your strengths. These assessments can introduce you to new skills you want to develop or confirm what you already know. They can also help you better understand yourself and others, which can lead to more effective communication and healthier relationships.

A few good personality assessments you can try include the following:

• Big Five personality test: The Big Five personality assessment identifies five personality traits, some of which are hereditary, that make up the dimensions of your personality. The test rates you on a continuum for each trait to determine your degree of openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.
• Enneagram: The Enneagram test is a strengths assessment that helps you understand your core beliefs, motivations, and behaviors by classifying you into one of nine personality types.
• DiSC assessment: This test evaluates your personality traits to help you understand how you behave in the workplace. The model has four main personality types, which are dominance (D), influence (i), steadiness (S), and conscientiousness (C). 
• Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI): The MBTI personality assessment helps you understand what energizes you, how you digest information, how you make decisions, and how you approach the world around you. By identifying you as one of 16 personalities, your results can help you improve your self-awareness.

If you’re looking to align your career path with your abilities, another self-assessment tool to invest some time in is a personal SWOT analysis. Filling out a SWOT analysis template can help you outline your professional strengths and weaknesses to help you achieve greater success in your job. 

Follow what feels good to you

If you’re good at something, you’re more likely to enjoy doing it. Mastering a skill brings satisfaction, competence, and a sense of accomplishment. Positive feedback from others, such as compliments, can reinforce these feelings, linking your personal achievements to both internal fulfillment and external rewards. 

Pay close attention to how you feel when you complete certain activities. Ask yourself whether it feels good to finish the task and if you enjoyed it throughout the process. 

Quiet your inner critic

It’s easy to get down on yourself about things you don’t feel you immediately excel at. However, just because you aren’t good at something right away doesn’t mean you won’t become good at it with time. 

If you notice your mind telling you to give up on activities you try early on, challenge it. Give yourself more time to learn and grow, especially if it’s something you enjoy doing. It could develop into your greatest skill yet.

Practice

Not every skill and strength is inherited or comes naturally. You can learn and master many skills with intentional effort and repetition. If you find something you like, practice it as often as possible. Regardless of whether you end up mastering it, you’ll have fun and gain a new skill in the process.

Don’t overthink it

Putting too much pressure on yourself to be good at something can cause you to overthink it. This drive can easily turn into an expectation for perfection. Perfectionism often leads to mistakes that cause you to come up short. Be patient with the process, and don’t force something that doesn’t feel meant to be.

Work with a coach

When something comes naturally to you, it can be easy to be blind to ability. This is where asking for an outside, third-party perspective can be helpful. 

Life coaches and career coaches are specially trained to help guide you to reflect on your strengths, values, and achievements. Talking about yourself or brainstorming out loud rather than keeping your thoughts inside your busy mind are also great ways to see things more clearly. 

11 questions to ask yourself to find what you’re good at 

Effective self-reflection starts with asking good questions. If you’re struggling to discover your interests, carve out time to ask yourself the following:

1. What empowers me?
2. What motivates me?
3. What comes naturally to me?
4. What are my career goals?
5. What was I good at as a child?
6. Which compliments do I tend to ignore?
7. Which skills have helped me thrive or overcome hurdles?
8. Which job types align with my purpose?
9. Which hobbies do I love?
10. Which skills have I successfully solved problems with?
11. Which activities are key to my happiness?

Understanding talents vs. passions

You may be good at what you’re passionate about, but your strengths and interests don’t always align. Some of your strengths may lie in aspects of work or life you dislike, or you could have lots of room for improvement doing something you love. Differentiating between your talents and passions is key to understanding yourself better. 

What you’re good at

Figuring out how to know what you are good at can be informed by the following three aspects:

• Innate talent: This refers to abilities you naturally have or skills that you pick up faster than others, which can help you discover what you’re good at. For example, solving puzzles or writing may come naturally to you. Or, you may easily learn new sports or show an aptitude for mathematical concepts.

• Knowledge base: With some subjects, retaining information may be easier for you than others. When considering what you’re good at, look back on times when you excelled without much conscious effort to discover which types of knowledge come naturally to you.

• Recognition: It’s really hard to keep natural talent a secret, and people will undoubtedly notice. Remember that it’s OK to accept compliments and praise. Humans are social creatures who rely on positivity to maintain mental well-being. Paying attention to where you get compliments can help you discover your talents.

What you’re passionate about

Identifying your passions can help you figure out your strengths and tell you where to focus on self-improvement. Passions are unique and personal, often shaped by the following key factors:

• Disregard for skill level: Unlike talent, you don’t need to be good at something to be passionate about it. Your passions may not put you on the best career path, but it’s perfectly fine to do things just because they put a smile on your face. For instance, you may enjoy singing even if you don’t have perfect pitch.

• Interests: Passions typically go hand in hand with interests. It may be harder to invest time in your passions, but if you’re having fun, it’s worth the effort. An interest can also develop into a passion with practice and immersion. And with practice can come developed skill and talent.

• Intrinsic motivation: The most noteworthy aspect of individual passions is that you do them for fulfillment and to find your purpose, not for recognition. Your passions can teach you to be thankful for this life and your freedom to choose to spend every day differently. You may or may not be good at what you’re passionate about, but finding your passions can help you narrow down your skills.

Why is it important to know what you’re good at? 

Recognizing your unique talents allows you to align your goals with your inherent abilities, leading to increased satisfaction and success.

You’ll feel more confident when you have a sense of what you’re good at. Personal well-being and mental fitness begin with understanding yourself, accepting yourself, and building on your strengths.

Learn how to figure out what you’re good at through coaching

Learning how to figure out what you’re good at can lead to greater satisfaction and fulfillment in life. It can bring you a sense of purpose and make you feel like you’re using your talents and abilities to realize your full potential.

Many people believe you can only excel at one or two things. But in reality, everyone has multiple skill sets, and it’s important to take advantage of that professionally. Finding your strengths through professional coaching can help you feel empowered in anything you choose to do with your life.

Be the best person you can be by working with a BetterUp Coach to discover the talents that help you stand out from the crowd.