There are many gifted people who live quiet lives. They have great learning skills, their functioning is more efficient, and yet are they the best known? Indeed many of them have problems with the school system and do not finish their studies. A large majority have a job unsuited to their skills. So, they don't especially shine.

Rather, we should ask ourselves this question: Which person is attracted to material success? surely not people with a high potential profile. They place little importance on money and do not seek fame. Why would they be the head of the company?

By observing well those who "succeed" in our society are rather those who know how to crush others and are stingy with power and money. So rather having a psychopathic profile.

Hello, I will try to answer your question.

First of all, it is necessary to see what you mean by brilliant, if it is about pure intellect it is obvious that it is difficult to measure, the Qi tests being only one clue among many. others to qualify a person. Not enough to characterize someone brilliant. In addition, our society insists (a little too much) on learning and often by rote. In fact, it is sometimes difficult to understand certain reasoning for complex problems, so you need "certain" values to estimate, hence a sometimes silly rote without support for understanding.

Often times a brilliant person will be called this because they've worked at something, they've "earned" their achievement. If learning facilities or certain talents come to help, work remains in my humble opinion a must. We can therefore take the definition by what it refers to, someone who has worked well and reaped the fruits of his labor. We are brilliant for our results. We miss each other two or three times and we are less "brilliant".

On the other hand, therefore, a person recognized as brilliant can for an infinite number of reasons stop shining: meetings (good or bad), achievement of personal goals, accident of life, the accident itself, and sometimes even personal choice.

Now, what do you mean by "nothing special"? Perhaps such a person wanted to be "only" a lawyer, to be "only" a baker, or educator, or teacher The prism through which we see success is first of all personal, success is measured by expectations of the person, not a salary grid imposed by a deregulated society, the expectations of parents or a spouse.

A potential, by definition, is a possibility, an estimated "achievable". Nothing guarantees that the person "endowed" with this wish to engage on this voice, nothing guarantees that faced with more difficulties and roughness, this potential will be sufficient.

Suddenly, taking into account the difficulties of the semantic fields of the words of the question, we realize that like everything in the human matter, almost everything is possible ... except in a system where whatever you do, you will never be able to match the wealth of M.Bernard Arnaud by your simple talent ^^ It is perfectly possible that a person has been brilliant, for billions of billions of reasons which are personal to him, is in a position where he wishes himself nothing other than live simply on what pleases her, the adversity of discovery, a sport in which she takes pleasure without excelling ...

Fortunately, "doing things" is not just for brilliant people it would be sad to die. 

My father is a lawyer, my mother is a plastic arts professional who has never worked for an employer. Both are over 70 years old, as much as my brothers and I are adults. She thought otherwise of investing all her talents in the education of her children. Thus, my father carried the wind to the mill and my mother produced the fruits. Would you think that my mother and all people like her - men and women, whether they are - did not invest well or exploit their potential? Yes, you might think so. But that would be wrong.

You can't have supremacy over everything. You have to choose in life. Some choose a professional career, others money, others a reputation, others to have a family that is harmonious and united in peace.

Let's be honest, we know people around us who are beyond extraordinary. They have capabilities not many do and I'm not talking about spiderman or Wonderwoman, it's about anyone who is excellent at what they do, or at least we can tell that they have the potential to do so much more. And yet, they don't do anything special, they don't channelize their energy productively.  

I think the most common reason for this is that they've been told that they're good for nothing far more times than they're told about how magnificent they are. So, eventually, even at a minor failure, they are convinced that no matter what they do, they won't be able to do anything and the fire inside them dims out. 

If you follow a more humanitarian school of thought, you would believe that all of us are brilliant in some way or another and in that context, it is true that not all of us can live up to our true potential and reach our optimum capacity. Although the reason for this is not have to be same, some of us do not get the opportunity to channelize our skills and make the most out of them. For example, people living in underdeveloped parts of the world have to worry more about putting food on the table than fulfilling their passion of becoming an artist. So, there's that. And in otther scenarios, the medium through which they can fulfill their dream is not available and they are forced to run in the rat race. But most of all I think the biggest resistance that people have is themselves, their own Minds telling them that their capability is limited and there is only so much they can do. If you two are having such thoughts, no that they are false!