“As our knees and hips and eyesight deteriorate, we become more dependable, less impulsive, kinder, and less moody.”

I do think that whatever ambition I may have had natively was amplified by my father’s clear valuing of it. I knew that was what my dad really cared about.

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.

Nobody gets to be good at something without effort, no matter what your aptitude is.

Really, what matters in the long run is sticking with things and working daily to get better at them.

The words that we use I think are symbolic of the values that we hold.

Everybody knows that effort matters. What was revelatory to me was how much it mattered.

And I’ve discovered a strikingly consistent pattern: grit and age go hand in hand. Sixty-somethings tend to be grittier, on average, than fifty-somethings, who are in turn grittier than forty-somethings, and so on.

If the quality and quantity of continuous effort toward goals matters as much as I think it does, we may actually get more productive, not less, as we get older – even if we can’t pull all-nighters like we used to.

I think the very idea of character, of developing not just grit, but empathy and curiosity, emotional intelligence.

Many things matter other than our measured intelligence, so let’s get to work on them.

I ended up doubling the math time that a conventional school would have. But I don’t think any of these things were path-breaking or unusual.

I would be surprised if my girls ended up as women without grit. I really would.

If you’re never able to tolerate a little bit of pain and discomfort, you’ll never get better.

I now have Grit Scale scores from thousands of American adults. My data provide a snapshot of grit across adulthood.

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?

Substituting nuance for novelty is what experts do, and that is why they are never bored.

Leaving the European Union really does give us a chance as a country to become more outward-looking, to become more competitive, and to deepen our links with our partners right across the world.

Knowledge is the eye of desire and can become the pilot of the soul.

Often I’ve had problems automatically bending to a lover’s will, becoming what I know they want me to be. Immediately, I learn all the music they love, listen to it, study it, instead of being like, ‘This is what I love!’

The bottom line is that if you become a master at handling problems and overcoming obstacles, what can stop you from success? The answer is nothing! And if nothing can stop you, you become unstoppable!

I would become a therapist and a leader in terms of mental illness. But I’m not in the position.

The vision is such that seeing and seen are one; object and act of vision have become identical.

You become financially free when your passive income exceeds your expenses.

Eunuchs do not take the gout, nor become bald.