Why Grit Isn't Enough

No amount of patience and perseverance can remove structural barriers.

“Grit” is one of my favorite words in the English language—and it’s something I always assumed I had until I got about a third of the way through Angela Duckworth’s 2016 book Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance.

Now, even when I put down the book, I feel like there’s a tiger mom in my head chastising me for not having the same interests at 38 that I had as a toddler. I’ve given up on a lot over the years—everything from Tae Kwon Do to my precious red pacifier. “Where are your fucking balls?” the tiger mom demands. It’s almost cruel.

For once, though, ChatGPT came to my rescue and assured me that plenty of legitimate scholars have found flaws in Duckworth’s thesis, which is more or less a regurgitation of the takeaways from Napolean Hill’s 1908 interview with Andrew Carnegie but with actual data to back up the claims. That interview was turned into a book that was so redundant and insipid in both its presentation and conclusions that I gave up early—and ironically, given that the point of the screed was to convince us mere mortals who work for a living that immense power and wealth can be attained simply by focusing on one goal and moving toward it fearlessly and methodically. Gosh, why didn’t I think of that?

I won’t be too hard on Duckworth—I’m still reading the book, after all. I haven’t given up on it yet. She discusses concepts like “deliberative practice” that are useful for a struggling writer who knows he isn’t getting a six-figure book deal without pushing himself to his limits. But I have no passion for writing about things I like, so by Duckworth’s own logic, I should cease with any praise for her book.

My main critique is the individualistic, singular focus of her emphasis on singular focus. The ability to stick with a specific goal through thick and thin, which is how Duckworth defines “grit,” is socially, culturally, and economically constructed. It is not as if a rich kid from Beverly Hills has an equal chance of demonstrating grit as someone straight out of Compton. (Of course, this is not to say that Compton hasn’t produced gritty people—it most certainly has.) It’s easy to be focused on a music career, for example, when you’re a trust-fund kid. You can putz around in your home studio for eight hours each day while the butler or your parents wait on you. But what if you’re some penniless prodigy from the other side of town who has to work, beg, borrow, and/or steal just to afford proper instruments and recording software? What if you don’t have any butlers—or parents? Even if you have more talent in the latter case, you’re at a disadvantage that grit alone likely won’t compensate for.

And let’s say you luck out and find a brilliant music teacher wiling to train you for free. What if the teacher is a psychopath who tries to kill you for not playing at his tempo? What then?

I raise this hypothetical not just because I like the movie Whiplash. My point is that perseverance often comes at a price. Duckworth acknowledges this herself—but only briefly. She’s clearly in love with the idea of mindlessly pursuing a singular dream as if doing so is the key to all success and happiness. Never mind that not all of us have the right genes or the right environment to grow up to be world-class athletes, spelling-bee champions, or overzealous authors.

Moreover, some of us might be quite talented and still refuse to be pigeonholed by one of our many talents. We might appreciate variety and/or novelty more than mastery. Mastery, after all, can get boring. For example, I really don’t understand why Shohei Ohtani still bothers to play baseball or why Stephen King continues to write. Why not try something else? Noam Chomsky made a name for himself in linguistics and went on to become one of the sharpest political minds in the world. But if Duckworth had her way, he’d still be talking about diction, deep structure, and other dull bullshit.

Duckworth may have found her calling peddling propaganda, but some of us don’t have a calling. And that’s okay: We don’t need one. We could be the smartest and most talented of all. We’ll never know for sure, though.

I say: Fuck the people who have their lives figured out.

Life is too short for that crap.