“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”
― Mae West
Have
you ever watched a movie where every character connects at the end in some way
or another? This is how I felt this week during class about topics we have
previously learned as they all have commonalities.
During the course of the week, we
began talking about Angela Duckworth and her research on “grit". She defines grit as, “sticking with things over the very long term until you master them.”
For a long period of time, intelligence has been the key to success as it was
the best measured human trait but from her years of research, she starts to conclude
that grit may be as essential to achieve success as intelligence is. But how can
grit and intelligence be the “keys” to success when Joachim de Posada said that
the most important principle for success is the ability to delay gratification
or have self-discipline? Clearly, Angela Duckworth would disagree with Posada
in that she found grit and self-discipline to be opposites. She says that, “the
grittiest, not the smartest students, have the highest GPA’s,” to sustain this
idea. However, they would probably agree that people are not born with the
ability to achieve success, but rather can develop the ability to be gritty or
ability to delay gratification in that both of them say these can be learned
and improved upon. This idea would go against the idea of the fixed mindset
simply because we are not born with it, but would support the growth mindset
theory in that we can learn to better ourselves and in turn reach success.
A second
connection I found to be interesting was between the audio my group was
assigned based on, “Is Conflict Good for Progress,” and the Kafka reading. The idea
of constructive conflict was a new idea brought to my attention this week and
is essentially finding those who are very different than us and finding ways to
connect with them so that we are exposed to changing our minds and think. The Kafka
article has the same idea and states, “people feel uncomfortable when their
expected associations are violated. This creates an unconscious desire to make
sense of their surroundings.” Therefore, both of these are explaining that when
you are exposed something or someone that doesn’t make sense to what you are
used to, your brain will respond by looking for other structures or patterns
which will create learning and getting used to new patterns. I found this idea
to be so interesting because it is almost backwards from the way we are taught
and can have such a positive outcome.
Lastly,
to be a gritty person, you must be motivated, recognize your downfalls, and
stick with something until it is mastered. The ideas of passion, inspiration,
and purpose can all be drives to help you be a gritty person and are also the
starting place of motivation. These ideas were mentioned in the motivation
article to help find activities meaningful as well as Angela Duckworth’s TED
talk listed as “qualities of a genius.” Although an elusive drive, motivation
is what helps us persevere through tough circumstances and persist over walls
built in front of us. Whether it is intrinsic or extrinsic, motivation is the
leader in compensating by working hard and having more determination, even if
our intelligence lacks. Carol Dweck would put this hand in hand with the growth
mindset in that even if we are not the most intelligent people, we can take challenges
as they hit us and use them to make us stronger.
Whether you believe Joachim
de Posada’s theory of delayed gratification and can wait for the marshmallow,
or Carol Dweck’s mindset theories, or even Angela Duckworth’s grit test, each
ties into what everyone is looking to achieve and that is success. The
motivation to push through, grit to stick with it, and finding what works for
you will lead to victory.
What will guarantee
your success and how will you get there?
References:
http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/tomorrows-college/grit/angela-duckworth-grit.html
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