Samiul Bashar Samin
It is a common belief that to achieve a goal one must work at it constantly – not taking a circuitous path towards it when a straight one is available. Thus the Overeaters Anonymous organisation, the Atkins diet, the South Beach diet, and so on, ban a variety of ‘bad foods’; financial planners would probably advise clients against going to fancy restaurants while saving up to buy a house or car; a pastor would seek to dissuade his congregation from sin, no matter how minor. In order to achieve a goal, the thinking goes, one mustnot deviate from the straightest course; to allow for mistakes or failures is to torpedo your chances of attaining your goal.And yet a new school of thinking is challenging these received ways and arguing that straying from the path, even engaging in hedonistic behaviour, might be the surest way to success.
Plus, much as we may want to achieve our goals – and be willing to work for them – there are limits to our capacity for work and will. That’s because willpower is a finite resource. Ego depletion (or a dwindling reserve of willpower) is the reason that you may feel less keen to exercise after a hard day at the office; it’s the reason poorer people, after expending energy on finding the best price on basic goods at the grocery store, may then buy bags of Skittles and lowbrow magazines at the checkout counter. You only have so much willpower to use before you need to take a break from decision-making and let it replenish.
The truth is, most people aren’t extremely gritty; they won’t be able to study for 15 hours a day for a spelling bee, or complete punishing military training courses in the summer heat.
And not even the grittiest are guaranteed success. In fact, the mindset needed to maintain persistent forward motion can be its own setback. People who are obsessive and who want the very best for themselves tend to be the grittiest.