#108 - Angela Duckworth, Learn how you can develop ‘grit’ and why you need it to achieve your goals!

Scarlett’s guest for this episode is Angela Duckworth, author of Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. Angela describes grit as having what some researchers call an”ultimate concern”– a goal you care about so much that it gives meaning to almost everything you do. Grit is holding steadfast to that goal even when you fall down and when progress toward that goal is halting or slow. Scarlett and Angela discuss growing hope because a growth mindset leads to optimistic self-talk that then leads to perseverance over adversity. 

 

Scarlett and Angela infuse the Choose Love Formula into the extensive research Angela has dedicated herself to on grit and personal success. This includes having the courage to find what you enjoy, thinking of something you are grateful for to stay positive and strengthen what you want to master, finding a deeper purpose greater than yourself, and having compassion in action which is doing something, not just feeling it. Hope is when we let our pain go and that is strengthened by practicing forgiveness. All of the Choose Love formula values (courage+gratitude+forgiveness+compassion-in-action) lead to the grittiness required to achieve your goals.

Angela Duckworth is an academic and psychologist focusing on achievement, researcher and author of Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. She is co-founder of Character Lab, a nonprofit whose mission is to advance scientific insights that help children thrive. She is also the Rosa Lee and Egbert Chang Professor at the University of Pennsylvania and faculty co-director of the Penn-Wharton Behavior Change for Good Initiative. Her podcast, No Stupid Questions, is part of the Freakonomics Radio family.