Welcome back to school Michigan student leaders! I hope you all had a relaxing, and re-energizing break. We have made it through the first half of the school year, and are onto a new calendar year which probably means finals and end of the semester tasks are upon you, and maybe you’re making some New Year’s resolutions; I think that makes this the perfect time to introduce this months topic of GRIT! 

Grit is a term coined by Angela Duckworth who has since written books, given TED talks, and done tons of research on this idea of grit- a combination of passion and perseverance. 

Her work thinking about grit came from her work as a teacher when she noticed some of her brightest, highest IQ students- weren’t always the ones achieving the highest grades. Her research quickly grew and expanded to settings outside of the classroom such as at West Point Military Academy and at the National Spelling Bee. In all settings of her research she was asking “who is successful here, and why?” The greatest indicator of success, across the board, was grit- a passion and perseverance for long-term goals. Duckworth describes this idea of grit as “living life like it is a marathon, not a sprint.” And guess what, we are all in luck because grit has nothing to do with talent, IQ, skill or anything outside of our control. 

Grit is all about effort and commitment to our goals. While you begin to look at your list of goals, ambitions, and resolutions for 2020, or maybe even this next decade I hope you keep in mind the idea of grit- that you don’t have to be the “best” in the room to get it done- you just have to care, and you just have to try every single day. Slow down and take life as a marathon, not a sprint. If you are interested in learning more about grit check out Angela Lee Duckworth’s TED Talk titled “Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. 

Good luck on finals and the rest of the semester- you’ve got this.

Stay Gritty,

Kayla K