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I often wonder how we can understand what we want, to be able to get it, whether in personal life as in studies and work. Methods, techniques and strategies? They are only a part of the process, of one’s own evolution. One of the possible steps to take. And then there is to deal with talent.

Talent is a strange thing, in my opinion. For the gifted, it is part of a multicomponential density from birth yet it is often difficult to see, understand and translate into action and future. It’s something that defines you in the eyes of others but sometimes makes us feel like we’ve won a lottery we’ve never chosen to participate in, while looking at other people’s lives as something that would be nice to have every now and then.

Is talent a choice?

Maybe yes, at least part of it.

Choice to train, to hunt for opportunities, to always keep your mind open especially in moments when everything is rowing against.

Choice of believing, alongside those who do it with us or despite those who do not do it for us.

Choice to do, even when you don’t know how or what.

Passion is born in the choice. In choosing yourself every day, for what you are and for what you love to do, there is all the passion to move forward, not to give up and to make your dreams come true.

Elisa Bianchi is exactly like that. A young woman who has a great talent and who already with her first single, in my opinion, knows how to show who she is.

The talent of being young

Those who know me know how much I love the energy of young people, how much I believe in giving them unconditional support, which sometimes means simply being there and letting them experience all possible failures to really learn to find themselves in the life they want.

That’s why, after listening to Elisa for the first time, it was wonderful to ask her to write her deepest voice with the words she preferred.

Because listening to a young talent like her means giving her space to be able to reach even her peers and younger children, to tell what is on the other side of the doubts, questions, insecurities. And what can there be from there on, such as the colors, the notes and the shades life can take just to try.

And it also means everyone learning a little to look at things with new eyes, maybe picking up that dream that is still there, somewhere, and starting to tell each other that, in the end, the essence of everything lies in the choices we make..

I have chosen Elisa for you.

And yes, even a little bit for me.

Enjoy the reading!

“Talent is nothing. At best it is an outlet, without passion. What makes life a jewel, which makes it worth living, despite the thousand pains, is passion alone. I learned to write, to play, to love, to sing, only thanks to her. Talent cannot be taught, passion is the first teaching I have ever received. Its value is imbued with painters with paint-stained hands and house walls, in singers who lose their voices, in writers with calluses on their fingers.

Maybe they are just my beliefs, but at least I believe in something. I have something that will never abandon me, that will never betray me. And it helps me, it makes me get up every day, at every little or big disappointment.

As soon as I arrived in London, on September 19^th 2020, a devastating terror assailed me; and no, I’ll never lie about it. I was not feeling well: I never felt safe, never free to feel serene. My first week I cried a lot, and that’s not like me. But what makes you stand up is always passion. From not being able to sing at all, I slowly picked up the guitar again, and, a month later, a new song was already born. You really do realize that you belong to certain places, and maybe even more than you thought.

Yes, I belong to this place, more than to the people. There is nothing wrong with loneliness, I believe. During my high school years I persisted in understanding what was good and bad for me. It is not simple: if you think about it, you realize that they constantly intersect, and leave you confused in the middle, to accept whatever comes before your eyes. Now I know that good and evil are too broad concepts to be analyzed in detail. What I need is an overall picture that is only good for me, even if it also hides a lot of pain, nostalgia, regret.

If I could talk to myself from 4/5 years ago, I probably wouldn’t blame her for anything. I would only warn her that it is useless to analyze every detail, it is useless to rethink projects continuously, and not sleep at night. I would tell her to rest while she can, because her future is already there waiting: yes, I would tell her that her only task is to never give up on that passion. Never forget the evenings spent on the bed listening to her mother playing the guitar, don’t forget the first concerts in orchestras, never forget even the first love.

Because all those memories are proof that emotion wins over everything; that it is better to feel deeply ill than to feel nothing. Life is a movie, and we are the directors. All these people running through the streets are nothing more than a company of actors, who swap roles all the time. Surely, therefore, if I could talk to myself a few years ago, I would tell her to make definitive decisions soon, and never be afraid.

In recent times (especially in my last months in Italy), I have met many young people in crisis for their choice of university, and this upsets me a bit. Many of those seemed to have suddenly forgotten their identity, and kept harassing each other with absurd questions (“who am I?” “But is there something I really like?”). They seemed so frightened of the decision that they forgot their past, memories, images and people. These things happen, it’s normal after all. At that point, however, you cannot abandon everything and make a hasty choice or dictated by fear. What you can do, if you can’t remember who you are, is reinvent yourself. Fall in love again and love life; restart where you stopped, because you are the director, and no one will ever give you directions on the film that only you can make.

For my own film, I’ve been letting myself get inspired. My parents were the first: very important, fundamental examples. Constant support, someone to always come back to.

When I started playing the guitar, writing songs, playing live … there wasn’t a moment when they doubted me. These are things that form you, that teach you to always get up. Never stop fighting… it is certainly not easy; but if you do it for someone who deserves it … that’s a whole different story.

And then, when, in one of my first concerts, I was asked (by my current producer) to record an EP, I took the opportunity. Thanks to that opportunity, I have something in my hand today. A single, “Dance with me”, which for me is a wonderful start.

Being able to share so much is a privilege. Writing songs is one thing, but publishing them is really another. A lot of people from Como wrote to me in the days following the release of the single, and it was really touching.

At the same time, many guys here in London helped me to get to know the city, they welcomed me to the fullest. Thanks to a London girl who lent me her camera, I made the video that is now on YouTube, and traveling around the city, looking for suitable places, images that represented my life here, it was an experience that he taught a great deal.

I’m learning more than ever, to be honest. I don’t spend my days on books, I don’t read often to be honest… but it doesn’t count. What I’m really learning now is living: living on your own, counting on your own strength. It’s not about becoming adults, or growing up … it’s about facing one challenge after another, remaining basically the same as always.

Never change, always learn.

“Don’t change for anyone”: these are the words that my grandmother said to me on the phone just yesterday before saying goodnight. Taken by my busy schedule, I hadn’t called her for a couple of weeks, and those words warmed my heart. Thanks to her, thanks to my parents, thanks to my friends, thanks to my producer, and then thanks to anyone who found 3 minutes to hear my first single or watch the video on YouTube, because thanks to them, I now know that many, many challenges await me.

And yes, I can say in complete sincerity that I can’t wait to face them: because it’s true, life is nothing but a challenge. “

Some dreams are truly “impossible”. But many aren’t. Knowing how to distinguish them is often the first step towards discovering the union between what we love to do and what we are good at. Because if you can see the possibility of making a dream come true, most likely you can also see the path to follow to do so.

Ken Robinson