#230| How Grit Beats Talent for Lasting Success: Overwhelm, Productivity, Time Management & People Pleasing

What if your success had far less to do with talent—and far more to do with one skill you can build starting today? That's the premise behind of one my favorite books: Grit, by Angela Duckworth.

It’s easy to believe you’re either naturally good at something, or you’re not. When things feel hard, uncomfortable, or slow, you might assume it’s a sign to cut your losses and quit. But what if the real predictor of success isn’t talent, intelligence, or even motivation—but your ability to stay consistent and tolerate discomfort? This episode breaks down the powerful concept of grit and how it directly impacts your productivity, confidence, and long-term success.

By listening, you will:

• A clear understanding of what grit actually is—and why effort counts twice as much as talent
• A practical framework for applying steady, sustainable effort without burning yourself out
• A powerful mindset shift that helps you build confidence, stop people pleasing, and stick with hard goals

Press play to learn how building grit can help you achieve your biggest goals with more calm, clarity, and confidence.

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Life can be overwhelming, but on this podcast, you'll discover practical strategies to overcome overwhelm, imposter syndrome, and negative self-talk, manage time effectively, set boundaries, and stay productive in high-stress jobs—all while learning how to say no and prioritize self-care on the Overwhelmed Worki...

Transcript

Michelle Gauthier 0:00

Your potential for success doesn't have as much to do with talent as we might have thought.

West Point And The Grit Predictor

Michelle Gauthier 0:08

You're listening to Overwhelmed Working Woman, the podcast that helps you be more calm and more productive by doing less. I'm your host, Michelle Gauthier, a former Overwhelmed Working Woman and current life coach. On this show, we unpack the stress and pressure that today's working woman experiences. And in each episode, you'll get a strategy to bring more calm, ease, and relaxation to your life. Hi, friend. Today we are going to be talking about the book Grit by Angela Duckworth. This made the list of my top 10 favorite self-help books ever. And I'm going to share the key takeaways so that you can decide if you want to read the whole book or if you just want to take these little takeaways, these little nuggets from today and apply them to your life. When you listen today, you'll learn what grit really is and why it matters, why effort over time beats intensity. And this is what I think was the most hopeful part of the book is that grit can be built. So it's not something that you just come with. You can also build your grit and how passion kind of ties into this whole equation. Okay, so let's talk about what grit is and why it matters. I thought this was such an interesting study that Angela Duckworth did. So over time, back from the 50s and probably still today, there have been many psychologists who have studied at West Point, the cadets who are able to get into West Point, which is a very small group of people. It starts off being thousands and it ends up being 1,200 people who get in. In order to get in, you have to have an amazing GPA, you have to be super physically fit, you have to have a recommendation from someone in Congress, not just good at athletics, but the captain of the team. You have to have leadership opportunities, you have to have all these amazing things in order to get in. So they narrow it down to these 1,200 cadets who end up getting in. They come for the first summer and they have a seven-week thing called the beast, where they go through all of this training, physical, mental, how to be a soldier, etc. And about one in five of the people of those 1,200 ends up dropping out. So it's interesting if you think how much it takes to get into that group of 1200 that one in five would end up dropping out. That was the question that she wanted to study. And what she found was that the predictor of who was going to drop out was not smarts or talent or athletic prowess or physical fitness. It was grit. The people who had the most grit were the people who stayed. And she's found that grit is a predictor of who wins the national spelling B, how professional athletes perform, which authors are more successful, which salespeople in average jobs end up sticking with it and being successful or quitting.

What Is Grit?

Effort Over Time Beats Intensity

Applying Grit To Time Management

Building Grit Through Discomfort

Michelle Gauthier 2:50

But what really is grit? The thing I love is that the author does agree that talent can give you a leg up. So if you're just naturally good at something, if you're just a natural athlete or naturally great at spelling or sales or whatever it is, that does give you a leg up. But the amount of effort that you put towards that gives you your skill in that area. And she gives many examples of professional athletes who weren't the best basketball player on their team, or when she was previously a teacher, students who didn't score as well on the aptitude test but did great in her class because they put in a ton of effort. So if you take the skill that you get from practicing the thing for which you have or don't have natural talent, over time, if you continue to put effort towards that, you get achievement. The way she says it is that effort counts twice. You take your natural talent and you times that by the effort that you put into it, and that gives you your skill. And then you take the skill and you put more effort into that skill and that gives you the level of achievement. What I love is that effort really counts twice as much as natural talent. Something that we talk about a lot on this podcast is effort and the amount of effort and time we put into things. And you might be thinking, oh great, she's saying, I just need to try harder, put more effort into things. No, that is not what I'm saying. What I am saying and what she says is that effort over time beats intensity. So steady effort over time, where you are deliberately practicing something, focusing and getting feedback on your weaknesses in that area and showing up even when you don't feel like it is where the real growth happens. Let's think about this in terms of trying to improve your achievement in the area of time management or people pleasing. If you think about the effort that you put towards that, it might look like deliberately planning your week, practicing that and seeing where your weaknesses are. So you've planned it. How do you do? Where did you do well? Where did you not do well? And then focusing on those areas where you didn't do well and trying to improve that. Maybe you really nailed the time management in your free time and your family time, but you didn't do as well at work. So you continue to work on that. And then continuing to do that, even when you don't feel like it, not because we're just putting effort towards anything, but because you really want to change your skills in this area. Maybe you don't feel like planning your week or you don't feel like telling someone no so that your calendar can be clear, but you do it. That is what we're talking about. Putting effort towards the things that you really care about where you want to improve your skills is grit. Something else that I love about the book, and my third and final point that I want to share with you about the book is that grit can be built. Maybe you have a natural talent for spelling or math or athleticism or whatever it is. Her point is that maybe life has given you the opportunity to be gritty and you're already good at being gritty. But if you're not, or if your kids aren't, there is always an opportunity to build grit. And the way that we build grit is by practicing things that are hard for us and learning to tolerate the discomfort. Back to my example of people pleasing. When I teach my one-on-one clients how to stop people pleasing, one of the very first things that I tell them is this will feel uncomfortable. You're not gonna die, nobody's gonna die, but this is going to feel uncomfortable. If you want to build your grit for saying no to people and becoming a person who does not people please, you have to practice it. You have to do it, you have to say no and not people please. And then you have to understand and tolerate the discomfort that comes with that. And eventually over time, it gets better and it's not very hard and it doesn't feel very uncomfortable. But to have the grit to stick with that is what it really takes to make that kind of change. So I love this book. I think my personal key takeaways from it, and the reason why I loved it so much is number one, after reading this book, I just felt so hopeful that if you choose an area that you're passionate about, and that's another big thing she talks about in the book, because you don't want to put effort and practice towards everything. You want to choose the things that you're passionate about where you can have sustained effort over time. But it made me very hopeful that if there's something that you want to accomplish, that if you apply grit to it, there's really nothing that you can't do. My other key takeaway was I really want my kids to be gritty. If I could give them one trait, grit would be it. But in order for them to have that, they have to go through some hard things and they have to have effort over time in order to overcome that thing, which as a parent feels very uncomfortable. I think it's human nature as a parent to want your children to not suffer, like to not have a hard time at school or to not have a hard time with friendships or athletics or whatever it is that they want to do. But it really made me see how sometimes challenges that we have from not having that natural talent in that area gives us an opportunity to build grit that can be helpful for the rest of our lives. I think a great takeaway for anybody who's listening today is to think of a place in your life where you have really applied a lot of grit and a place where maybe you want to apply more. And maybe you think about buying this book, or maybe you just start thinking about how you can start taking sustained effort over time, sitting through the discomfort of making those changes, trying to improve in the areas where you have weaknesses, and then eventually becoming successful in that area. That's it for today. Tell you what, it took me a lot of grit to get through this podcast because this book is so good and it's very hard to give a short review. So I'll pat myself on the back for that one. Okay, have a great week. Thank you for listening to the Overwhelmed Working Woman podcast. If you want to learn more about my work, head over to my website at MichelleGauthier.com. See you next week.