Searching for success

A couple of weeks ago, I read an article on a study by an American psychologist on achievement. I was so intrigued by the article that I decided to carry out a research on understanding her findings and how it influences the world and in a narrower sense, me. The psychologist, Angela Duckworth, says that the key to outstanding success is not talent, which is an ingredient too, but rather a special blend of persistence and passion that she calls ‘grit’. She defines grit as sustained passion and perseverance for especially long term goals. However, what I found particularly intriguing about this study is how much it is in ‘opposition’ to the prevailing attitude today. Because of the prevalence of social media and the internet, instant gratification is the in thing. Most people just assume that success is instant and that if you keep at things for a few years then you would and should become very successful at it. Social media even makes it a lot harder with glossy and shiny pictures of fame that never really show the hard work beneath the success. Duckworth mentions that grit is so not instant that even the minimum number of years to show any sort of impact in any meaningfully sustainable way will be ten years.

Buhari approves N10bn for rehabilitation of Enugu Airport

Ten years is a pretty long time to keep at anything and it will require a mindset that is totally different to sustain that kind of tenacity. It is much easier to go from job to job seeking success than it is to stick to just one against all odds, confident that you will succeed. The novelty of change makes the switch much more palatable and even appealing than staying a course. Some might even call it boring. This is why Duckworth notes that excellence is a long story that has parts that are not suspenseful; in fact they are often made up of parts that are mundane. They are not just snapshots but rather they are a long movie with dialogue and scenes that we will rather have edited out. Another thing she mentions that I find so interesting is the part of failure. So often, we view success, outstanding success in this case, as a series of success stories that finally get noticed by the world and culminating in one giant success story. Angela says that, “people who succeed fail all the time maybe even more than anyone else”. It is grit, that sustained combination of passion and perseverance that keeps them getting up in spite of all the failures. We need to banish the idea that failure is in itself a bad thing, failure is more of an opportunity. An opportunity to get up, to learn, to unlearn and to relearn. Geniuses are not people who fail, but rather they are people who keep on even after they have failed.

I recently saw a movie about the Nobel laureate, John Nash, titled A Beautiful Mind. What I noticed was that despite all the problems he faced, he refused to give up. He kept at it even with a mental illness and one day, he was recognized for it. His outstanding success was as a result of his grit. His perseverance and passion for his work. While he was at graduate school, a lot of people laughed at him but he did not let that deter him, he believed he could do it and then he did it. That is grit! Furthermore, Duckworth mentions in her study that to achieve grit, it goes beyond just putting in the work. It is actually putting in the right type of work which she calls ‘deliberate practice’. She says that deliberate practice is made up of four parts. The first is intentional and specific goal, that is, something you want to achieve specifically usually based on your weaknesses. She mentions that geniuses do not spend their time patting their backs because of their strengths but rather they identify their weaknesses and strive to strengthen them. I find this very intriguing. We are used to the mantra, practice makes perfect but she is actually saying that it is not just any practice but rather sustained practice that leads in the path of success. Therefore I could set a goal and work towards it but if I am not working towards the right goal then I would not succeed at it even after years of practice.

The second thing she mentions is a hundred percent focus. There are no distractions from your goal, no oh I would do it later tomorrow after watching this show. It is rather a long term concentration that yields fruit. The third is feedback. You could practice to improve on your weaknesses all day long but if you are not getting feedback from all that hard work, it could all go to waste. Lastly, she mentions reflect and refine based on the feedback. Grit requires constantly correcting, constantly trying to be better than yesterday. Constantly going at it again and again to see ways of improving. Only when all these things are combined does grit actually come into play.

The lessons that we take from this study are many. One is that while talent and intelligence plays a huge role in giving us a hand to success, it is actually perseverance more often than not that distinguishes the extraordinary from the ordinary. Another lesson is that passion does not always yield results immediately, just because you love what you do does not mean that there will not be a lull period. There is nothing wrong with the mundane as long as you sustain your passion through it. The third lesson, albeit a very important one, is that there is really no success without failure. Failure is not the end, it is just a stepping stone to success. Never be afraid to fail. The final lesson that I will mention which happens to be my favourite is that anyone can be gritty if they want and choose to be, all they have to do is learn to be by finding something they love and keeping at it. Genius really can be acquired, all you need is grit.

Personally, I love getting to know more about this seemingly understudied quality, grit. I have put quite a bit of effort into honing my skill of writing but too often I have been accused by my family members of being inconsistent. I am not exactly extraordinary at it but I have put effort into making it work but I have done that at a pace that can be considered completely lazy. While grit has to do with showing up no matter what, I am the sort to find an excuse not to show up. This new learning about grit has forced me to reexamine my priorities. What I am passionate about and exactly what I should be gritty about. I have always loved writing but I think it is finally time to add perseverance to my passion if I ever want to succeed at writing anything at all. It is a much deserved lesson, one that everyone should take to heart, not just me.

• Wale-Olaitan is of the Faculty of Education, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.