When you’re great at one thing, you’re usually great at other things. History is littered with people who liked to dabble in a thing or two beyond their focus. Did you know what Mozart was a fine gardener? Or that Euclid could throw a tight spiral? Or that Jane Austen was an incredible whistler? But these days, people want you to stay in your “lane.” If you’re good at one thing, just do that until you can’t do it anymore.
This is an idiotic analogy, since at some point, everyone has to change lanes, either to exit or to pass an exceedingly slow-moving vehicle. No one stays in one lane forever unless you’ve had a clear mental break or want to see what happens when you're out of gas.
Athletes usually bear the brunt of this demand from the public. But look, if you’re good at dribbling a basketball, or shooting into an empty net, why shouldn’t I listen to what you have to say about geopolitics? The fact that you can palm an orange rubber ball with one hand puts you on the same footing as the likes of Richard Holbrooke. Spinning the ball on your finger like a classroom globe is all you need to have a better understanding of internecine conflicts. Able to thread it through your legs while racing up and down the court? Great. Then you’re one step away from a groundbreaking dissertation on complex economic theory.
If you can grasp a basketball, you can easily grasp every facet of world history. It’s that simple.
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