Childhood is generally far too early to know what we want to be when we grow up.
ANGELA DUCKWORTHThere haven’t been genetic studies on grit, but we often think that challenge is inherited but grit is learned. That’s not what science says. Science says grit comes from both nature and nurture.
More Angela Duckworth Quotes
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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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Every day, parents and teachers ask me, ‘How do I build grit in kids? What do I do to teach kids a solid work ethic? How do I keep them motivated for the long run?’ The honest answer is, I don’t know.
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The parenting style that is good for grit is also the parenting style good for most other things: Be really, really demanding, and be very, very supportive.
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To me, the most shocking thing about grit is how little we know, how little science knows, about building it.
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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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Very few people can keep going their whole life doing something and feel like it’s merely personally fascinating.
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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.
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I would be surprised if my girls ended up as women without grit. I really would.
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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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You cannot will yourself to be interested in something you’re not interested in. But you can actively discover and deepen your interest.
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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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So when my daughter told me on the second track meet that she was done with it because she discovered she didn’t like competing, I made her finish the season.
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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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Drive is something that can be encouraged by a wonderful teacher, by a terrific classroom environment, by an awesome soccer team that you are on, and it can be squashed as well.
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Why do some people try, try again, and why do some people not? That’s what I’m after.
ANGELA DUCKWORTH