Grit

src: Grit: The power of passion and perseverance

What is Grit and why it matters

Showing up

• the highly accomplished were paragons of perseverance
• talent is no guarantee of grit

Effort counts twice

• talent is how quickly your skills improve when you invest effort
• achievement is what happens when you take your acquired skills and use them
• with effort, talent becomes skill and, at the very same time, effort makes skill productive
• grit has 2 components: passion and perseverance

How gritty are you?

• top level goal as a compass that gives direction and meaning to all the golas below it
• most of your action derive their significance from their allegiance to your ultimate concern, your life philosophy
• grit is about holding the same top level goal for a very long time
• idea that every waking moment in our lives should be guided by on top-level goal is an idealized extreme that may not be desirable
• the more unified, aligned, and coordinated our goal hierarchies, the better

Grit grows

• necessity is the mother of adaptation
• like every aspect of your psychological character, grit is more plastic than you might think
• first come interest, passion begins with intrinsically enjoying what you do
• next comes the capacity to practice
  • one form of perseverance is the daily discipline of trying to do things better than we did yesterday
  • to be gritty is to resist complacency
• third is purpose: what ripens passion is the conviction that your work matters
  • interest without purpose is nearly impossible to sustain for a lifetime
• finally hope, hope is a rising-to-the-occasion kind of perseverance
  • hoppe does not define the last stage of grit, it defines every stage

Growing grit from the inside out

Interest

• first encounter with what might lead to a lifelong passion is just the opening scene in a much longer, less dramatic narrative
• people are enormously more satisfied with their jobs when they do something that fits their personal interest
• people perform better at work when what they can do interest them
• when you start to get interested in something, you may not realize that’s what happening
• interest thrive when there is a crew of supporters
• the reality is that our early interests are fragile, vaguely defined, and in need of energic, years-long cultivation and refinement
• shortcutting the stage of relaxed, playful interest, discovery and development has dire consequences
• if you have not fostered a passion, you must begin at the beginning: discovery / experiment
  • what do I like to think about?
  • where does my mind wonder?
  • what do I really care about?
  • what matters most to me?
  • how do I enjoy spending my time?
  • what do I find absolutely unbearable?
• after discovery comes development
• interest must be triggered again and again and again
  • find ways to make that happen
  • have patience
  • development of interests takes time

Practice

• Kaizen = continuous improvement
• experience does not always lead to excellence
• how expert practice: they set as stretch goal, zeroing in on just one narrow aspect of their overall performance
• use deliberate practice
• rather than focus on what they already do well, experts strive to improve specific weaknesses
• experts hungrily seek feedback on how they did
• deliberate practice is experienced as supremely effortful
• world class experts can only handle a maximum of 1 hour of deliberate practice before a break, and only 3 to 5 hours per day
• deliberate practice requires working where challenges exceed skill, and flow is most experienced when challenge and skill are in balance
• deliberate practice is a behavior, flow is an experience
• primary motivation for doing effortful deliberate practice is to improve your skill
• when in flow, everything feels effortless
• deliberate practice is for preparation, flow is for performance
• basic requirements of deliberate practices:
  • a clearly defined stretch goal
  • full concentration and effort
  • immediate and informative feedback
  • repetition with reflection and refinement
• getting the most out of deliberate practice: make it a habit
• another suggestion for getting the most of deliberate practice: change the way you experience it

Purpose

• intention to contribute to the well-being of others
• 3 bricklayers are asked: what are you doing?
  1. “I am laying bricks”
  • A job: view as a necessity of life
  2. “I am building a church”
  • A career: view as a stepping stone to other people
  3. “I am building the house of God”
  • A calling: my work is one of the most important things in my life

Hope

• grit depends on different kind of hope
  • expectation our own efforts can improve our future
  • gritty people have nothing to do with luck and everything to do with getting up again
• pessimists are more likely to suffer from depression and anxiety
• optimists fare better in domains not directly related to mental health
• no disappointment, think more like something to learn from
• happiness wasn’t just the consequence of performing well at work, it might also be an important cause
• keep searching for ways to change your situation for the better, you stand a chance of finding them

“Whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you are right.” Henri Ford

• fixed mindset vs growth mindset
• people with growth mindset are grittier
• children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them
• children develop more of a fixed mindset when their parents reacts to mistakes as though they are harmful and problematic
• most people have an inner fixed mindset pessimist in them right alongside their inner growth mindset optimist
• like a muscle that gets stronger with use, the brain changes itself when you struggle to master a new challenge
• practice optimistic self-talk
• extreme pessimist ⇒ find a cognitive behavioral therapist
• with practice and guidance, you can change the way you think, fell and act when the going gets rough
• one final suggestion: ask for a helping hand

Growing grit from the outside in

Parenting for grit

• there’s no either/or trade-off between supportive and demanding parenting
• there’s no reason you can’t do both

                                        supportive
                                           ^
            permissive parenting           |  wise parenting
                                           |
undemanding <------------------------------+------------------------------> demanding
                                           |
            neglectful parenting           |  authoritarian parenting
                                           v
                                      unsupportive

• what matters more than the message parents aim to deliver are the messages their children receive
• it’s the child’s experience that really matters
• many paragons of grit have their parents as their most admired and influential role model

The playing fields of grit

• kids thrive when they spend at least some part of their week doing hard things that interest them
  • when kids do extracurricular activities, they are both challenged and having fun
• school is hard, but not intrinsically interesting
• beneficial if performed for more than a year
• personalities do change after childhood
• have a fierce resolve in everything you do
• demonstrate determination, resiliency and tenacity
• use mistakes and problem as opportunities to get better, not reasons to quit
• if you want to create a great culture, you have to have a collection of core values that everyone lives
• once you have done the work to clear vision, it is the discipline and effort to maintain that vision

Conclusion

• grow your grit from the inside out
  • develop daily challenge, exceeding skill practice
  • connect your work to a purpose beyond yourself
  • learn to hope when all seems lost
• grow your grit from the outside in
  • parents, coaches, teachers, bosses, mentors, friends, …
• while happiness and success are related, they are not identical
• the grittier a person is, the more likely they will enjoy a healthy emotional life
• we all face limits, not just in talent, but in opportunity
  • but more often than we think, our limits are self-imposed

Resources

• how to raise children with grit