Your Professional Superpowers Are Gathering Dust

Converting the buried treasures you already possess.

I recently had one of those experiences that gives you goosebumps and connects you to your past in a way you never expected.

There they were, spread across my kitchen table, over 40 reels of 8mm film, meticulously labeled with dates and events spanning the late 1960s through the early 80s. “Xmas ‘67,” “Summer ‘73,” “Easter ‘79,” “Back Yard,” “July ‘75” — little 50 ft. time capsules that had been sitting quietly in a green metal box at my parents’ house for decades.

The crazy part was that my mom had been holding onto these treasures all these years. But without a film projector, they remained locked away. Physically locked away, of course, but also locked away from our family’s collective memory. My older sisters appear in most of them, my brother and I in a few as toddlers, but none of us had ever seen this footage.

“Dang it, Mom!” I laughed when I realized what she’d been keeping from us.

Not intentionally, of course. She simply didn’t have the means to share them.

But, thanks to modern technology, I enlisted a local company to convert them to digital video. The anticipation was incredible. It took two weeks to get them from the company, and it felt like Christmas.

What would we see?

Who would we recognize?

What moments, long forgotten, would suddenly spring back to life?

And the videos didn’t disappoint. Watching them for the first time was surreal, like discovering a part of your identity you never knew was missing. There were scenes of childhood birthdays, family vacations, and endearing backyard moments suddenly brought to life after being hidden in a container for nearly half a century.

I watched my sisters, decades younger than I’ve ever known them, playing in yards I vaguely recognized. I saw myself as a toddler, taking uncertain steps across a living room that exists only in these frames now. I glimpsed relatives who passed away before I could form proper memories of them. I saw my mom and dad in their early years as young parents in their twenties.

My mom is 82 now!

As I sat at my computer taking it all in, I was transfixed by these moving images from the past.

These 8mm film reels had always been there, sitting in mom’s house, containing their precious memories, but their value remained locked, untapped, and essentially nonexistent to us. It wasn’t until the right technology came along (the digital conversion service) that these dormant resources suddenly transformed into something incredibly valuable.

And if you know me, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to find a lesson here for my readers.

We all have untapped resources sitting dormant in our lives, waiting for the right technology or perspective to unlock their value.

This is a powerful truth that has transformative implications.

Think about your career for a moment.

• What resources, skills, or knowledge do you possess, essentially sitting dormant in their own “green box,” waiting to be rediscovered and converted into something valuable?

I would venture to guess you’ve developed specialized skills that have been filed away.

Maybe you:

• Learned design skills in a previous role but never applied them to your current position

• Developed public speaking abilities during college that you haven’t utilized since

• Mastered software or platforms that you no longer use daily but still understand deeply

• Used problem-solving approaches in one industry that could be revolutionary in another

• Have the ability to write, but have never challenged yourself to put your work out there

These resources & skills haven’t disappeared, they’ve gone dormant.

Like my family’s films, they exist in an “outdated format” that needs conversion to become valuable again.

Our professional networks are perhaps the most underutilized resources we possess, so let’s start there.

• Former colleagues who have moved to companies you’d love to work with

• Mentors who provided guidance years ago and would gladly do so again

• Industry connections from conferences or events that never developed beyond a LinkedIn connection

• Classmates who have evolved into potential collaborators or clients

These relationships don’t vanish. Those people still exist (hopefully ❤️). They need the right “conversion technology” to transform them from dormant connections into active, valuable resources.

How many brilliant ideas have you had over the years that never made it past your notes app or journal?

• Business concepts you brainstormed but never pursued

• Process improvements you identified but never implemented

• Creative solutions you imagined but never developed

• Market insights you recognized but never capitalized on

These ideas, like those film reels, don’t lose their intrinsic value over time, they need to be retrieved, dusted off, and viewed through a contemporary lens.

In my case, the conversion from analog film to digital video made all the difference. The memories weren’t new, they had always existed, but the format made them accessible, shareable, and suddenly valuable assets again.

This principle of conversion applies directly to your career skills and resources.

Let’s explore what this conversion process might look like in practice.

Start by inventorying skills you’ve developed throughout your career, especially those you haven’t used recently but have never gone away.

Then consider:

• How might these skills apply to current career challenges?

• What modern tools or approaches could enhance these foundational abilities?

• Which of these skills are increasingly rare or valuable today?

• What complementary skills could you add to make these more relevant?

For example, if you were skilled at creating detailed reports in a previous role, you might convert this by learning data visualization tools that transform your analytical abilities into compelling visual stories.

Then consider your relationships. Relationships require regular maintenance to remain valuable, but even long-dormant connections can be revitalized.

• Reach out with a specific, genuine reason for reconnecting

• Share an article or resource that made you think of them

• Ask for their perspective on an industry development

• Propose a specific collaboration that benefits you both

The key is approaching reconnection as mutual benefit, just as I shared those converted films with my siblings, creating new value, joy, and happiness for all of us. It was mutually beneficial, not one-sided.

And ideas often remain undeveloped because they were ahead of their time, lacking necessary resources, or overshadowed by more urgent matters. Your most innovative solutions might come from combining old ideas with new contexts.

To convert them:

• Reevaluate the idea’s relevance to your current job conditions

• Connect it with complementary concepts you’ve developed since

• Apply new technologies or methodologies that didn’t exist when you first had the idea

• Find collaborators who bring different strengths to help implement the concept

There is emotional resonance in rediscovery.

What struck me most about watching these films was experiencing the emotional resonance they still carried decades later. My sisters and I connected over shared moments we’d never viewed before. We filled in gaps in our family narrative that had been missing.

Your professional “archives” carry similar emotional weight.

When you rediscover and repurpose what you already possess, you reclaim parts of your identity that contribute to a more complete career narrative. They bring out and highlight the best parts of you.

This process of rediscovery can reignite passion for your work, remind you of your capabilities, help you get recognized, strengthen long-lost relationships, and restore confidence that might have eroded over time. Just as I felt a renewed connection to my family history through these films, you might experience a renewed connection to your purpose through this process.

Don’t wait 40 years to do it.

My mom had a good reason for letting those films sit in a closet for 40+ years. The technology to easily view them wasn’t readily available, and professional conversion services were expensive until recently. But in our careers, we often let valuable assets sit idle even when we have everything we need to activate them. The opportunity cost of this inaction is significant.

Consider what might have happened if:

• You had applied that specialized knowledge to solve a pressing problem last year

• You had reconnected with that former colleague before they moved into a decision-making position

• You had developed that innovative idea before someone else brought it to market

The green metal box in my mom’s house protected those films for decades, but it also kept them from enriching our lives all that time.

Your professional skills and resources could meet that same fate.

So how do you begin this conversion process in your career?

Here are some practical steps:

1. Take inventory: Set aside time to catalog the skills, relationships, ideas, and experiences you’ve accumulated throughout your career. If you’ve ever thought “that doesn’t count because anyone could do it,” write it down — it’s probably your superpower.

2. Assess their current relevance: For each asset, consider how it might apply to current challenges, opportunities, or contexts in your field. The skills you most take for granted are often precisely what others find most impressive about you.

3. Identify conversion methods: Determine what technologies, perspectives, or complementary resources would help transform these dormant assets into active value.

4. Prioritize based on potential: Focus first on the assets that promise the highest value with the least conversion effort.

5. Create conversion habits: Build regular time into your schedule to continue this process of rediscovery and conversion.

6. Share your converted assets: Like my family gathering to watch those old films, true value often emerges when you share your converted assets with others.

As I sat watching those flickering images of my childhood, I realized that these films had always been valuable, they just needed someone to recognize that value and take action to unlock it.

The same is true for the dormant resources in your life. They aren’t waiting for some magical external force to activate them. They’re waiting for you to recognize their potential and convert them into formats that create value today.

• What valuable resources are sitting in your professional “green box” right now?

• What will be your first step to convert them into something that enriches your career (and perhaps the careers of others) today?

Don’t let your professional treasures sit dormant for decades. We chase new skills while believing we lack resources, yet we’re like people dying of thirst while sitting on buried water reserves. Don’t become blind to your most natural talents because they feel too obvious to count as “special.”

No one else on this planet has your exact combination of experiences, skills, and perspectives. That alone makes what you can offer inherently valuable and impossible to replicate. Your worth remains intact, waiting for you to recognize it again.

Start the conversion process now.

You will be amazed at what you already possess.

Have you ever rediscovered something valuable in your professional life that had been dormant for years? I’d love to hear your stories in the comments below.

❤️

Thanks for reading.

Are you looking to stand out and improve how others experience you? I teach soft skills that get you hired and promoted. Connect with nearly 5,000 others on my Medium page, or add me on LinkedIn, Instagram, and X.

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