Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance

Psychology and the Real World:
Essays Illustrating Fundamental Contributions to Society,
ed. Morton A. Gernsbacher et al. (New York: Worth Publishers, 2011),
56–64. See also Sidney K. D’Mello and Arthur C. Graesser, “Confusion” in 
International Handbook of Emotions in Education
,
ed. Reinhard Pekrun and Lisa Linnenbrink-Garcia (New York: Routledge, 2014), 289–310.
:
Ericsson et al., “The Role of Deliberate Practice.”
Graham, “I Am a Dancer.”
Judd Apatow, interviewed by Charlie Rose, 
Charlie Rose
, July 31, 2009, republished
in Apatow, 
Sick in the Head: Conversations About Life and Comedy
(New York: Random House, 2015), 26.
K. Anders Ericsson, “How Experts Attain and Maintain Superior Performance: Implications for the Enhancement of
Skilled Performance in Older Individuals,” 
Journal of Aging and Physical Activity
8 (2000): 366–72.
Karen Stansberry Beard, “Theoretically Speaking: An Interview with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi on Flow
Theory Development and Its Usefulness in Addressing Contemporary Challenges in Education,” 
Educational Psychology Review
27
(2015): 358. Csikszentmihalyi has emphasized that what matters to the quality of our momentary experience is the 
subjective
level of
challenge and the 
subjective
level of skill.
:
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, “Play and Intrinsic Rewards,” 
Journal of Humanistic Psychology
15 (1975): 50.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, “Flow: The Joy of Reading,” in 
Applications of Flow in Human
Development: The Collected Works of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
(Dordrecht, Netherlands: Springer, 2014), 233.
K. Anders Ericsson and Paul Ward, “Capturing the Naturally Occurring Superior
Performance of Experts in the Laboratory,” 
Current Directions in Psychological Science
16 (2007): 349.
Csikszentmihalyi, 
Applications of Flow
, xx.
Ibid.
Ibid.
:
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and K. Anders Ericsson, “Passion and World-Class
Performance” (presentation, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, August 2006).
:
In this study, flow was measured using a previously validated six-item questionnaire whose possible scores ranged from a
minimum of 1 and a maximum of 5. Example item: “Whether at work or play, I am usually ‘in a zone’ and not conscious of myself.”
See Katherine R. Von Culin, Eli Tsukayama, and Angela L. Duckworth, “Unpacking Grit: Motivational Correlates of Perseverance
and Passion for Long-term Goals,” 
Journal of Positive Psychology
9 (2014): 1–7.

---

:
Gaines, interview.
Mads Rasmussen, Danish rower and Olympic gold medalist, in an interview with the author, June 28, 2015.
Rod Gilmour, “Ledecky Betters Own 1500m Freestyle World Record,” Reuters, August 3, 2015,
http://in.reuters.com/article/2015/08/03/swimming-world-1500m-idINKCN0Q813Y20150803
.
:
Ashley Branca, “Katie Ledecky: ‘I’ve Just Always Felt Comfortable in the Water from Day One,’ ”
Guardian
, March 10, 2015.
Duckworth et al., “Spells Success.”
:
Bruce Gemmell, USA National Team swimming coach, in an interview with the author, August 24, 2015.
:
Kerry Close, 2006 Scripps National Spelling Bee champion, in an interview with the author, August 10, 2015.
K. Anders Ericsson, “The Influence of Experience and Deliberate Practice on the
Development of Superior Expert Performance,” in 
Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance
ed. K. Anders
Ericsson et al. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press), 685–706. For a fascinating study of the importance of practicing
“strategically,” see Robert Duke, Amy Simmons, and Carla Davis Cash, “It’s Not How Much; It’s How: Characteristics of Practice
Behavior and Retention of Performance Skills,”