Striving is exhausting. Sometimes I do say things like, ‘I wish I were not quite this driven to be excellent.’ It’s not a comfortable life. It’s not relaxed. I’m not relaxed as a person. I mean, I’m not unhappy. But… it’s the opposite of being comfortable.
ANGELA DUCKWORTHI define talent as the rate at which you get better at something when you try. To be very talented means you get better faster and more easily than other people or other things that you try.
More Angela Duckworth Quotes
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One of the challenges of commencement speeches is that you have this older, wiser person who is accomplished talking to young, not-yet-so-wise, not-yet-accomplished adults or, in high school or middle school, even younger.
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Some people prefer a world where we’re all equally talented in everything. Whether you prefer that world or not, I don’t think that world exists.
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Most people who are really, enduringly interested in something eventually find that it’s important, too – and important to other people.
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The most important thing parents can do, although it’s not the only thing they should do, is model the behavior they want from their kids.
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My dad was not super-intentional in his parenting. He was very self-absorbed. I won’t say mean or selfish per se, but very self-absorbed. I think he was just thinking out loud.
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I stayed for lunch for extra tutoring, gave kids my cell phone, and was available. In my first year of teaching,
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The focus on just thinking about standardized test scores as being synonymous with achievement for teenagers is ridiculous, right?
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I define talent as the rate at which you get better at something when you try. To be very talented means you get better faster and more easily than other people or other things that you try.
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There are no shortcuts to true excellence.
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Grittier soldiers are more likely to complete their training, and grittier salespeople are more likely to keep their jobs. The more challenging the domain, the more grit seems to matter.
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When people think of the word ‘drive,’ they often think you have it or you don’t, and that’s where we’re wrong.
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Really, what matters in the long run is sticking with things and working daily to get better at them.
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Being gritty doesn’t mean not showing pain or pretending everything is O.K. In fact, when you look at healthy and successful and giving people, they are extraordinarily meta-cognitive. They’re able to say things like, ‘Dude, I totally lost my temper this morning.’ That ability to reflect on yourself is signature to grit.
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I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about my genes because I can’t do anything about them.
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When people tell me I can’t do something, I have a visceral reflex to say, ‘Yes, I can.’
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