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Chapter 7: Practice
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Grit, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Passion, Perseverance, and Success
Developing Grit
Psychology and Human Development
Grit and Society
Summary
Analysis
High-grit people’s passions usually depend both on their interest and on a sense of purpose—or “the intention to contribute to the well-being of others.” Some people prioritize purpose—like the childhood cancer patient Alex Scott, who raised millions of dollars for cancer research. But, as Benjamin Bloom pointed out, most people start with their interests in their “early years,” practice and improve in their “middle years,” and finally find purpose in their work during their “later years.”
Interests motivate people by encouraging them to do things for themselves, whereas purpose motivates them by encouraging them to do things for other people. Of course, the strongest motivation of all depends on interest and purpose coming together: that is, when people find their work inherently interesting while also believing that it benefits others. But Bloom’s analysis suggests that it's unrealistic to expect to find a sense of purpose right away. Instead, people generally choose work that interests them and then look for a sense of purpose in that work later on.
Themes
In interviews, when Duckworth’s “grit paragons” mention purpose, they always mean that their work benefits other people. For instance, after recovering from lupus in her twenties, artist Jane Golden moved home to Philadelphia to work on the Mural Arts Program. Thirty years later, she still works on the program, which she views as a way to serve others. Even people in less service-oriented jobs can find a sense of purpose—for instance, the wine critic Antonio Galloni views his job as a way “to help people understand their own palates.”
Golden’s work demonstrates how gritty people combine their interests with a sense of purpose: she brought her personal interest in art into a job that benefits others. Meanwhile, Galloni’s more unconventional sense of purpose shows how virtually every job affects others in some way, and it’s up to the people to identify how—and whether—this matches their values.
Themes
During her research, Duckworth started to wonder if high-grit people give priority to selfish goals or selfless ones. Even Aristotle recognized that some people seek happiness through pleasure, while others do so by finding purpose. Indeed, humans evolved to seek pleasurable things like food and sex, but also to connect and cooperate with others. To understand which motivates people more, Duckworth gave a questionnaire to 16,000 adults. She found that, while people tend to value pleasure equally regardless of grit, grittier people tend to value purpose much more. Of course, not all gritty people are altruists—many evil dictators have been gritty.
Duckworth’s research backs up the anecdotes she has provided so far in this chapter. Gritty people aren’t totally selfish or totally selfless; rather, they balance selfish and selfless goals. Still, this research doesn’t indicate whether selflessness makes people gritty, grit makes people selfless, or both. And the answer to this question is significant because it suggests that people can learn to find a sense of purpose, just like they can learn to develop their interests and improve through deliberate practice.
Themes
Most people view their work as a job or career, but a small minority sees it as a true calling. People in this minority tend to have more grit and be more satisfied with their lives. As the legendary journalist Studs Terkel discovered after interviewing hundreds of workers, most people wish their job were a calling. But management professor Amy Wrzesniewski has found that the kind of work people do doesn’t determine whether they feel they have a job, career, or calling—instead, their perspective on their work does. People often think that they need to go out and discover their calling, when in reality, they just have to develop it by changing their own perspective.
Studs Terkel’s interviews and Wrzesniewski’s research suggest that, just as most people don’t find their work interesting, most people also don’t find their work purposeful. But while the solution to uninteresting work is often developing new interests and finding a new job, the solution to purposeless work is often finding a new perspective on one’s existing work (especially if it’s interesting). Indeed, Wrzesniewski’s research suggests that anyone can find a sense of purpose in their work if they learn to understand how it helps others. This indicates that purpose—like all the other aspects of grit—is learnable under the right circumstances.
Themes
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For instance, Joe Leader, the New York City subway’s head engineer, started working in transit because it was the first job he got. He found the subways interesting and enjoyed planning out projects. Soon, he started to view transit engineering as a long-term career, and then as a way to contribute to society as a whole. Similarly, the medicine professor Michael Baime found his calling by merging his lifelong passion for mindfulness with his purpose—helping people become healthier. He first became interested in meditation as a teenager, and he nearly quit medical school because he wasn’t engaged in it. But he enjoyed helping people by working as a doctor, and he eventually realized that he could combine it with mindfulness by teaching meditation classes.
Joe Leader and Michael Baime’s stories demonstrate how, over time, people can develop a sense of purpose in the areas that interest them. Moreover, they also serve as a reminder of Duckworth’s main idea from Chapter Six: following one’s interests is a long process. Leader and Baime didn’t initially choose their career paths because of interest and passion—instead, they became interested in a particular aspect of their work after starting. This is when they began feeling the need to give back to others, and that feeling led them to identify connections between their interests and the common good. In other words, following one’s interests and developing a sense of purpose are really two halves of a much longer self-discovery process.
Themes
Duckworth first felt a sense of purpose in college, when she taught at a summer program for disadvantaged middle schoolers. After the program, she saw how teachers can change children’s lives, so she and another student founded their own summer enrichment program. Their sense of purpose helped them stubbornly push through the administrative and fundraising work they needed to do. Ever since, the program has grown dramatically. However, Duckworth wasn’t satisfied with teaching: she also wanted to do science and understand human nature through psychology. Like many people, then, she had a sense of her interests as a teenager, but she didn’t clarify her purpose until her 20s or seriously integrate her interests and purpose into a “life-organizing goal” until her 30s.
Duckworth’s personal investment in her summer program demonstrates how the desire to help others can strongly motivate people to succeed. But it also shows how people often feel and start pursuing a sense of purpose without fully combining it with their interests, since her work with the summer program didn’t involve her interest in science. Thus, Duckworth has identified two distinct paths to connecting one’s interests with a sense of purpose. First, people can follow their interests and eventually look for a way to serve others through them (like Wrzesniewski recommends). Second, people can also pursue their interests and their sense of purpose in parallel until they find a way to integrate them. This is what Duckworth did: she pursued her purpose—helping young people—through the summer program, all the while pursuing her interests in talent and achievement by studying psychology and neuroscience. Eventually, she managed to integrate them into her “life-organizing goal” of helping young people through psychological science.
Themes
It’s easy to assume that people have to choose between their “self-oriented” and “other-oriented” goals, but business professor Adam Grant knows that this isn’t true. For instance, he found that firefighters and fundraisers work harder only if they’re both interested in their jobs and invested in helping others. Similarly, developmental psychologists David Yeager and Matt Bundick have found that young people with both selfish and other-oriented interests find their schoolwork more meaningful.
Grant, Yeagar, and Bundick offer more clear-cut empirical evidence for the basic insight driving this chapter: gritty people succeed by connecting their interests to a sense of purpose. Indeed, since interest and purpose are the two halves of passion, any true long-term “life-organizing goal” must incorporate both. Yeagar and Bundick’s research suggests that even young people begin to balance selfish interest with their selfless purpose—but this doesn’t mean that the balance can’t change over time.
Themes
“Grit paragons” often don’t find a sense of purpose immediately or directly. For instance, Aurora and Franco Fonte started cleaning buildings to pay the bills, then founded a building maintenance company. But today, they see their company as a way to help their clients and employees. Developmental psychologist Bill Damon argues that people can and should cultivate a sense of purpose. First, they need to spark their interests. Second, they need inspiration from a role model who shows them what a purposeful life looks like. Then, they need to discover the problem that matters to them and see how they can personally change it.
Duckworth reiterates that grit is a long-term goal, not a constant personality trait. In other words, grit is like a muscle that people must work to develop over time, not a quality that they can simply acquire in a single moment. The same is true of its components, including purpose. Damon’s guidelines for cultivating purpose can point people in the right direction—but they’re not a foolproof formula for pulling purpose out of thin air. However, these guidelines overlap substantially with Duckworth’s advice for cultivating interest, which again shows that it’s possible to develop both interest and purpose in parallel.
Themes
Kat Cole’s story demonstrates why people need role models for purpose. Cole’s single mother juggled three jobs and three daughters but still helped out others in her community as much as she could. This inspired Cole to work hard and help others. After joining Hooters as a waitress, Cole moved up the company hierarchy. She eventually got recruited to be Cinnabon’s president at just 32 years old. As a waitress, Cole took on extra responsibilities like helping cook and train employees—both because she would earn more and because she could help others. Management rewarded her for her initiative. Eventually, she realized that her passion is helping people recognize their greatness and succeed.
Kat Cole is special because her primary interest is her sense of purpose—she wants to help others both because she personally enjoys it and because she believes in the inherent value of doing it. As Duckworth points out, Cole’s mother taught her to balance her own needs and wellbeing with other people’s, which shows how effective parenting can pass grit on to young people. Notably, this lesson was also the key to Cole’s professional success, because it led her to work hard and get noticed by her managers.
Themes
Duckworth concludes with three psychologists’ recommendations for “cultivating a sense of purpose” at any age. David Yeager suggests reflecting on the purpose of one’s current work, while Amy Wrzesniewski suggests “job crafting,” or looking for ways to connect one’s current work to one’s values. And Bill Damon suggests identifying “purposeful role models” and explaining in writing why they’re so inspirational. When Duckworth tried this exercise, she realized that her mother is her greatest inspiration. Duckworth’s mother’s kindness showed Duckworth the power of devotion to others and led her to create the summer education program after college.
Duckworth concludes the chapter by focusing on what her readers can actually do to become grittier. Yeager, Wrzesniewski, and Damon’s ideas are all actionable and evidence-based. Crucially, all of them start with reflection, which again shows how purpose is mostly about perspective. But these exercises don’t have to end with reflection—they can also encourage people to make key changes in their lives. In particular, reflecting on one’s work and “job crafting” can lead people to look for new positions or job functions that better fulfill their sense of purpose, while identifying role models can help people become role models and help others.
Themes
