Living with a 99% Effort
I got this list from entrepreneur and business author Harvey Mackay’s book “Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty.” (If you click on the name of the book, you can see a portion of the book from Amazon) In the book, he gives credit to Armond Bouchie for using this list in his job application portfolio.
If we had to live with 99% effort, we would have:
One hour of unsafe drinking water every month,
Two unsafe plane landings per day at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport,
16,000 pieces of lost mail every hour,
22 checks deducted from the wrong bank account every week,
500 incorrect surgical operations every week,
12 babies given to the wrong parents every day,
20,000 incorrect drug prescriptions each year, and
800,000 credit cards with incorrect information.
A 100% effort makes sense.
This next portion of the post contains some of my takeaways from Texas A&M Women’s Assistant Bob Starkey’s Coaching Blog Hoop Thoughts Blog
HOW DO YOU MEASURE ON THE “GRIT” SCALE?
Mitch Cole
Some educational researchers have defined GRIT as “passion and perseverance to achieve long term goals”. When struggles come, do you get more DEJECTED or more DETERMINED?
Studies have shown that the attribute of GRIT, is one of the most powerful indicators of success. The most GRITTY people usually succeed on and off the playing field or court.
Teams can become selfish during good times and turn on each other during tough times. Teams that stay together can resist the temptation to be selfish, can withstand tough times, and even conquer insurmountable odds.
Most people can appreciate a team or athletes that refuse to give up no matter what the circumstance. Resilience is the ability to bounce back from difficulty and in some cases, be better than before. This can happen when the other team goes on a run and things look most bleak, or even within a season. Teams that “Fight” and show tremendous Resilience over and over again have the best chance for sustained success.
When winners get knocked down, they get up, champions get up a little faster.
“Being relentless means constantly working for that result, not just when drama is on the line. Clutch is about the last minute. Relentless is about every minute.” -Tim Grover From “Relentless: From Good to Great to Unstoppable”
U of Penn Duckworth Lab study found that “grit” (passion & perseverance for long-term goals) is best predictor of success. “Grit is unrelated w/ talent.”
The Duckworth Lab focuses on two traits that predict success in life: grit and self-control. Grit is the tendency to sustain interest in and effort toward very long-term goals. Self-control is the voluntary regulation of behavioral, emotional, and attentional impulses in the presence of momentarily gratifying temptations or diversions. On average, individuals who are gritty are more self-controlled, but the correlation between these two traits is not perfect: some individuals are paragons of grit but not self-control, and some exceptionally well-regulated individuals are not especially gritty. While we haven’t fully worked out how these two traits are related, it seems that an important distinction has to do with timescale: As Galton suggested, the inclination to pursue especially challenging aims over months, years, and even decades is distinct from the capacity to resist “the hourly temptations,” pursuits which bring momentary pleasure but are immediately regretted.
In terms of Big Five personality, grit and self-control both load on the conscientiousness factor, which also encompasses dependability, punctuality, and orderliness, among other facets.
Some educators typically prefer the umbrella term “social and emotional learning,” whereas many other educators, as well as philosophers and positive psychologists, embrace the moral connotations of “character” and “virtue.” So, grit and self-control are facets of Big Five conscientiousness, but are also conceptualized as dimensions of human character, social and emotional competency, and non-cognitive human capital.
That Extra Effort
For another angle on the importance of a 100% effort, click on the image below for a very inspirational video:
think you are really going to like this video that shows us that there is not a lot of physical difference between top performers and also rans. The big difference is in their mental strength and persistence! Click on the icon to see the video.
As I start my 43rd year of coaching football with my 37th year as a head high school coach, I thank you for sharing your research on “Grit” as such an important ingredient of success in anything in life that is difficult to achieve but in the long run is worth it. It is refreshing to see an “old” word that had such strong meaning long ago and practically vanished to see it come back.
“Obedient” would be another word that would be refreshing to see back again.
Thank you.
Jude Kelly
Head Football Coach
Saint Paul Catholic High School
Bristol, CT
Congratulations Coach Kelly on your success and longevity. That is a testament to your commitment to student-athletes and our sport. Good luck this year and many more years to come!
Great article, did not see the video link?
The timing of this is perfect! Our school started a “grit” campaign about a year ago. It involves students and people from our community, young and old, who were nominated as individuals who display GRIT in their everyday lives.
Posters of all those nominated arw going to be put on display, individually, all across our city, Wilmington, Ohio. They go on display October 15, 2016.
As the high school softball coach, I plan to piggy back on this article with my softball program, as it coincides so perfectly with our community campaign.
Thank you so much for sharing this inspirational article.
Glen Blessing
Wilmington High School Softball
Wilmington, Ohio
Hi Glen, thanks for the reply and glad that the article fits with what you are working on!
Here is a brief video to show about Wilmington Ohio Grit…
https://youtu.be/IovNQ1CuT34
Also, thanks for sharing the video. I enjoyed watching it.
Great job. Just finishing my 48th year coaching volleyball and, aftr playoffs, will start my 48th in basketball. What you’ve said is so true and ,coaching girls, the drama is a big thing.