Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance - by Angela Duckworth
Date read: 2017-01-23How strongly I recommend it: 8/10
(See my list of 150+ books, for more.)
Go to the Amazon page for details and reviews.
Great book on how grit can surpass talent. Leverages many examples of how to obtain grit at an early age and how to teach grit to kids and to employees. Highly recommend for anyone who's trying to get more out of what they do every day. It also compliments topics such as deliberate practice found in So Good They Can't Ignore You by Cal Newport.
Contents:
My Notes
To have great you have to have determination and direction.
Potential is one thing but What we do with it is quite another.
The "naturalness bias" is a hidden prejudice against those who've achieved what they have because they worked for it, and a hidden preference for those whom we think arrived at their place in life because they're naturally talented. We may not admit to others this bias for naturals; we may not even admit it to ourselves. But the bias is evident in the choices we make.
By shining our spotlight on talent, we risk leaving everything else in the shadows. We inadvertently send the message that these other factors-including grit-don't matter as much as they really do.
The most dazzling human achievements are, in fact, the aggregate of countless individual elements, each of which is, in a sense, ordinary.
When we can't easily see how experience and training got someone to a level of excellence that is so clearly beyond the norm, we default to labeling that person a "natural."
Mythologizing natural talent lets us all off the hook. It lets us relax into the status quo.
The factors to success:
talent x effort = skill
skill x effort = achievement
Achievement depends on just two things: talent and effort. Talent - how fast we improve in skill - absolutely matters. But effort factors into the calculations twice, not once. Effort builds skill. At the very same time, effort makes skill productive.
Eighty percent of success in life is showing up.
Consistency of effort over the long run is everything.
Without effort, your talent is nothing more than your unmet potential.
Grit has two components: passion and perseverance.
Enthusiasm is common. Endurance is rare.
Passion is a compass - that thing that takes you some time to build, tinker with, and finally get right, and that then guides you on your long and winding road to where, ultimately, you want to be. You care about the same ultimate goal in an abiding, loyal, steady way. Each day, you wake up thinking of the questions you fell asleep thinking about. You are, in a sense, pointing in the same direction, ever eager to take even the smallest step forward than to take a step to the side, toward some other destination. Most of your actions derive their significance from their allegiance to your ultimate concern, your life philosophy. You have your priorities in order.
Grit is about holding the same top-level goal for a very long time.
To find out what your passionate about begin at the beginning: discovery. Ask yourself a few simple questions: What do I like to think about? Where does my mind wander? What do I really care about? What matters most to me? How do I enjoy spending my time? And, in contrast, what do I find absolutely unbearable? Begin with the answers you're surest of and build from there and don't be afraid to guess or erase an answer that isn't working out.
Warren Buffett's three step approach to finding your passion:
Any successful person has to decide what to do in part by deciding what not to do.
It's as if the highest-level goal gets written in ink, once you've done enough living and reflecting to know what that goal is, and the lower-level goals get written in pencil, so you can revise them and sometimes erase them altogether, and then figure out new ones to take their place.
Lectures don't have half the effect of consequences.
There are four psychological assets that mature paragons of grit have in common:
A first encounter with what might eventually lead to a lifelong passion is exactly that - just the opening scene in a much longer, less dramatic narrative.
One of the huge mistakes people make is that they try to force an interest on themselves. Without experimenting, you can't figure out which interests will stick, and which won't.
At the start of an endeavor, we need encouragement and freedom to figure out what we enjoy. We need small wins.
Grit paragons don't just discover something they enjoy and develop that interest - they also learn to deepen it.
For the beginner, novelty is anything that hasn't been encountered before. For the expert, novelty is nuance.
Gritty people do more deliberate practice and experience more flow.
Each of the basic requirements of deliberate practice is unremarkable:
To get the most out of deliberate practice you must make it a habit.
Purpose is the intention to contribute to the well-being of others. The long days and evenings of toil, the setbacks and disappointments and struggle, the sacrifice-all this is worth it because, ultimately, their efforts pay dividends to other people.
Three bricklayers are asked: "What are you doing?" The first says, "I am laying bricks." The second says, "I am building a church." And the third says, "I am building the house of God." The first bricklayer has a job. The second has a career. The third has a calling.
In the parable of the bricklayers, everyone has the same occupation, but their subjective experience - how they themselves viewed their work - couldn't be more different.
How you see your work is more important than your job title.
Three recommendations on cultivating a sense of purpose:
It isn't suffering that leads to hopelessness. It's suffering you think you can't control.
When you keep searching for ways to change your situation for the better, you stand a chance of finding them. When you stop searching, assuming they can't be found, you guarantee they won't.
Growth mindset and grit go together.
Author and activist James Baldwin once put it this way: "Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them."
Avoid teaching a fixed mindset and instead practice a growth mindset.
There's no reason you can't be both a supportive and demanding parent (aka authoritave parenting).
Be "child-centered" in the sense that you clearly put your children's interests first, but don't feel the children are always the better judge of what to do, how hard to work, and when to give up on things.
It's important for parents to show passion and perseverance for long-term goals in order for their children to grow up with grit.
You don't need to be a parent to make a difference in someone's life. If you just care about them and get to know what's going on, you can make an impact. Try to understand what's going on in their life and help them through that.
When kids are playing sports or music or rehearsing for the school play, they're both challenged and having fun and they're especially beneficial when we do them for more than a year.
The Hard Thing Rule:
If you want to be grittier, find a gritty culture and join it. If you're a leader, and you want the people in your organization to be grittier, create a gritty culture.
On your own, you can grow your grit "from the inside out": You can cultivate your interests. You can develop a habit of daily challenge-exceeding-skill practice. You can connect your work to a purpose beyond yourself. And you can learn to hope when all seems lost. You can also grow your grit "from the outside in." Parents, coaches, teachers, bosses, mentors, friends-developing your personal grit depends critically on other people.