What if the Secret to Success is Failure?

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You have to be smart to be successful right? Perchance there is more to success than just talent and intelligence. People are born with the natural ability to be intelligent, but that does not predict their dedication and commitment to a successful life. Characteristics like grit are pursuing with long-term goals and desiring improvement. Even after failing, one exerts self-discipline to succeed from a motivational perspective. Continuous learning efforts after experiencing discouraging setbacks can enhance the outcome of achieving success as Duckworth mentioned in the transcript, “…like it’s a marathon, not a sprint.”
Duckworth defines grit in the transcript as "pursuing long term goals with passion and perseverance, emphasized by stamina to continue to work hard at your goals." I agree with her definition based off experience. I have always had the natural ability to achieve passing a class without having to study or put forth effort until I started college. I started college thinking that I could breeze by and never open a book like I previously had done in high school. Soon enough, I found out that I was wrong. I had to work hard and fail a couple of times to realize the proper way of learning the required material. I was so used to doing things on my own and always succeeding that I had to train myself to have patience and endure the task with a new outlook and perseverance to achieve success. I had a choice to continue to fail or try something new and work hard to pursue my future.
In the TED video, Duckworth says that grit is often "unrelated or inversely related to talent." I agree with Duckworth because lack of talent doesn’t mean you cannot cultivate yourself into becoming successful. People need to believe that failure...

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...each you. So in my opinion, growing up discouraged because of lack of teaching and encouragement could affect someone’s mental ability later down the road.
Even though IQ is well-known to predict success, one shouldn’t be limited to just that characteristic. Grit is a compelling predictor of success because each of us have the capabilities to do well in life by building upon more than just quick and easy learning. Grit has many exceptional things going on right now, but there are still some things unanswered. Although, there is not an answer to explain how to build grit in people just yet, researchers are planning to complete this next step and come up with some answers!

Works Cited

Duckworth, Angela. “Is Having Grit The Key To Success.” NPR/TED STAFF, 1 Nov. 2013.
Web. 1 Feb. 2014.
"Is Having Grit The Key To Success." TEDTalks. 1 Nov. 2013 Web. 1 Feb. 2014.

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