Episode · Freakonomics Radio · 2016-05-05
Books mentioned on 246. How to Get More Grit in Your Life
The psychologist Angela Duckworth argues that a person's level of stick-to-itiveness is directly related to their level of success. No big surprise there.
Angela Lee Duckworth discussed Grit by Angela Duckworth. Stephen Dubner discussed Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell and Peak by Anders Ericsson and others.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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Grit
Grit by Angela Duckworth explores the psychological importance of passion, perseverance, and delayed gratification in achieving long-term success.
Discussed“So the message of the book is not that grit is a good thing in particular. The message of the book is that, like so many other things about us that are good, we can do something to intentionally cultivate grit in ourselves and in others that we care about.”
Where to get it
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Outliers
Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell is an examination of the external factors, cultural legacies, and massive amounts of practice that contribute to extraordinary success.
Discussed“And then that second stage is practice. Particularly deliberate practice. The kind of deliberate practice that kind of went viral when Malcolm Gladwell wrote Outliers. We got into that in our previous episode, the Gladwell version in Outliers, which is built around something called the 10,000-hour rule.”
Where to get it
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Peak
Peak by Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool is a comprehensive study of expertise and deliberate practice that explores how individuals achieve peak performance through specialized training rather than innate talent alone.
Discussed“But the real guru of deliberate practice is Anders Ericsson, author of the book Peak. And I'm a professor of psychology at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida. There are several components to deliberate practice, but generally it's about using good feedback to focus on specific techniques”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (2) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
“I am also author of a book called Grit, The Power of Passion and Perseverance.”
“I think about how glad I'm not in school anymore because school forces you to do all sorts of things you hate like to swim in a really cold pool or to learn French or, you know, to write humanities papers about Lord of the Flies. Things that I really wouldn't want to have to do.”