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When people tell me I can’t do something, I have a visceral reflex to say, ‘Yes, I can.’

Angela Duckworth

When I was 27 years old, I left a very demanding job in management consulting for a job that was even more demanding: teaching. I went to teach seventh graders math in the New York City public schools.
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Consult Demand Demanding Even Job Management More Old Seven Teaching Twenty Year
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.
ANGELA DUCKWORTH

Everything People Prefer Some Talent Wally World
One thing that’s true of gritty people is they love what they do, and they keep loving what they do. So they’re not just in love for a day or a week.
ANGELA DUCKWORTH

Day Do Gritty Love Loving One People Think True Week
Is it ‘a drag’ that passions don’t come to us all at once, as epiphanies, without the need to actively develop them?
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All Come Country Develop Drag Need Actively Once Passion People Person
If you’re never able to tolerate a little bit of pain and discomfort, you’ll never get better.
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Able Better Bit Discomfort never Pain Tolarte
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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Many, many individuals will report starting to form their lifelong interests around adolescence. Why that is, researchers don’t fully know. But if you can take a trip down memory lane and see what interested you, that’s at least a clue as to where your interest may begin to develop.
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Adolescence Around Individual Interest Lifelong Many Report Start
There is a fluency and an ease with which true mastery and expertise always expresses itself, whether it be in writing, whether it be in a mathematical proof, whether it be in a dance that you see on stage, really in every domain. But I think the question is, you know, where does that fluency and mastery come from?
ANGELA DUCKWORTH

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It is important to realize that the process of ‘fostering’ a passion takes trial and error. It takes experience; you cannot do it all in your head. And it takes a long time.
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Grittier students are more likely to earn their diplomas; grittier teachers are more effective in the classroom.
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Classroom Country Diploma Earn Effective Grittier Likely More People Place Student Teacher
There’s something about taking the path of least resistance that makes a lot of sense. But at the same time, we have to figure out which things in life are worth struggling through.
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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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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.
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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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I worked hard as a teacher. But those are completely different career paths. And the lack of direction is why I didn’t get far enough in any of those things.
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Career Completly Direction Enough Harder Path Teacher Thing Work
I didn’t tell my kids, ‘You have to play viola, and you have to play piano.’ They chose these things on their own, and I don’t think we have to give kids every choice, but we do have to give them some choice because that autonomy is crucial for fostering passion.
ANGELA DUCKWORTH

Absorb Actual Complete Kid Piano Play Point Something Viola Well

When people tell me I can’t do something, I have a visceral reflex to say, ‘Yes, I can.’

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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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