Grit. Stick-to-it-iveness. (An impossible, almost Seussian word to say. I don’t recommend it—) Getting things done. Those people.
Is it important? If it is, how important? People seem to lead content lives minus the quality, so what’s the big deal? Why all the fluster and bother?
Maybe it’s the fault of ongoing research on the subject. Angela Duckworth decided to figure out why some people were able to stay with something, be it West Point or prolonged academic study. Her findings suggested it had nothing to do with aptitude or an ability to perform on tests; it was some innate quality that produced grit.
Grit. Determination. Dedication. Stubborn, even. Tenacious. Loyal? Perhaps. Perhaps loyalty is a quality associated with grit. Maybe grit is a decision, like an adult choosing to love or not love someone. To close a door even when it’s the last thing a person wants to do.
Aim, then. Grit can give aim to one’s efforts. It’s like training for a marathon or learning to box. Grit keeps people going when they want to quit, when they think they can’t possibly compete. It keeps them focused on the end goal.
All good things, and yet—grit is not, according to Duckworth’s studies, a quality celebrated in the workplace. Employers want employees who will work hard but not too hard, not invite self-comparison, people who can adapt, change direction within a minute’s notice, be agile—which is not a bad quality, either. Agility keeps a person from getting stuck in a rut, from sticking with a relationship or project that is already dead on arrival.
In that regard, grit can be detrimental. It can cause a person to feel guilty about quitting even when quitting—maybe a different word should be used—is the right thing to do. It can cause myopia, blind spots, prejudice. It can produce workaholism, too, and a pursuit of perfection rather than excellence.
Grit is not, however, evil. It’s a bit like money. Money isn’t evil, but the love of it is. Maybe the same principle should be applied to grit. Grit can be good but only when it isn’t the prized possession. It’s grit in service of something, someone else. It’s the quality of perseverance and persistence to accomplish a goal, and both of those characteristics are encouraged in the Bible. The widow gets the judge to act because she’s persistent; the believer is called to a life of sanctification and perseverance.
Maybe it’s the goal that needs to be evaluated more so than the grit. Some goals are good; some are bad; and some are murky. The only way to know which goals should be attended to is to consider them regularly, to question if they are the good works to which one has been called to accomplish. Perhaps in that way grit and agility can coexist because neither one is the important matter; what is important is going in the way God has called a person to go, and, when the person knows it, to go after it with all one’s might, with all one’s grit.
Image: Kelly Cookson (Creative Commons)