And the idea of the film is that you should discover what those are and embrace them. I guess the problem you run into is when you're in Linguini's place early on in the film. He wants to cook, but he has no idea how. And it's not to say that he couldn't have figured out how to cook, it's that he recognized Remy's talent and figured that he could kill two birds with one stone: 1) he would get to look like a great cook in a great Parisian restaurant and 2) Remy would get to cook for people. It never seemed like Linguini WANTED to learn how to cook. But you could argue that Remy never tried to teach him either. Maybe there was a language barrier.

It would have been interesting to see Linguini attempt to learn cooking or Remy attempting to teach. The film would have taken a rather different tone.