I think it's stretched my problem-solving muscle parts of my brain, but didn't really make me any smarter. I just had to work out solutions using the materials I'm working with, which is new to me.

I suspect that a lot of builders are generalists - good at a lot of things but not really masters of much at all - that like to tie different skill sets or ideas from multiple disciplines together.

Spacial reasoning + basic skills + ego + confidence = builder.