Let’s go right to the science. Angela Lee Duckworth is one of the preeminent researchers on what makes successful producers and performers successful. She was at University of Pennsylvania. And here’s what she found. When she studied the children, for example, who were getting the A’s, it’s not the smartest ones who were getting the A’s.
When she studied other people, let’s say in business or in science or sports, it wasn’t those with the natural talent that were getting the best results.
It was those people who were the most relentless. And she’s coined a term I want you to really think about and play with over the coming days, weeks, and months. She calls it grit. It’s the person with the most persistence that becomes the best performer.
And that works in really beautifully with Anders Ericsson’s research on the 10,000-hour rule or the 10-year rule.
And just to remind you, he is the preeminent researcher in the field of high performance. And
when he studied the great chess masters, and when he studied the great entrepreneurs, and when he studied the great violinists, and when he studied the great creativity of people, what he found was it wasn’t the most talented who wins.
I mean, that is the myth of our society. We look at a great cellist or a great rapper and hip-hopper. We look at a great soccer player. We look at a great musician. We look at a great entrepreneur and we seduce ourselves into thinking they are cut from a different cloth. They are not, they are relentless. They do not give up. They have ferocious levels of stick-with-itness until they get to where they want. And until they get the results they need.
You have what it takes. The real question is this, are you willing to do what it takes? Are you
willing to put in the 10,000 hours of practice on the one skill until you reach a point where you start to look like a genius? I mean, Mozart, the first 10 years of composing music, his compositions were mere curiosities. It was only after 10 years that the sparks of genius started to present themselves.
And that is really the mindset that I have observed were working with some of the best
performers in the business working with some of these billionaires. And watching the best leaders in the world. They are absolutely relentless. Good enough is not good enough for the epic performer. They want to be great. They want to be the best there ever was. They want to be iconic. And if you want to be iconic, I absolutely challenge you, do not give up. Stay with it until you get where you want.