Persistence

Or is it called “grit”?

Photo by Dave Lowe on Unsplash

Recently, I’ve read a couple quotes that absolutely knocked my socks off.  One quote was striking for its substance, the other for whom it is attributed to.  We’ll cover the latter quote in another Stack, but this week we’ll talk about the first quote on persistence.

The quote can be found on the last page of a book mentioned in the last Not Legal Advice Stack: Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ‘72 by Hunter S. Thompson.  Dr. Thompson didn’t actually write the quote (I think), but rather he attributes it to a McDonald’s Hamburger Corporation ad he read in a magazine after the 1972 election.  Yes, I’m pretty sure he’s talking about that McDonald’s. Yet, I say “I think” because this quote is so dissimilar to current Micky D’s advertising–you may remember it from such ads as Ba Da Ba Ba Ba–that it’s very possible that Thompson attributed the quote to McD as tongue-in-cheek.

Here it is:

Press on.  Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.  Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.  Genius will not: unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.  Education alone will not: the world is full of educated derelicts.  Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.

I’ll let you decide if that came from a hamburger ad.  

Press On?

Persistence is a virtue that anyone can tap into throughout their life.  It can pull you through tough times or push you to great heights.  But I have found that, when it comes to persistence, the act of persisting is not as hard as deciding when to persist.  If you know you have to do something or otherwise don’t have a choice, chances are you can do it, even if it’s not fun.  Maybe a parent or teacher requires something of you, or maybe you can’t practice law until you pass the bar exam.  

However, for a lot of life, you do have a choice.  You could run a marathon, which will take a lot of training if you don’t want to destroy your body at the race, but you could also, well, not run a marathon.  Sure, it would be a great achievement, but nothing says you have to and your life can be just as fulfilling without running 26+ miles.

A marathon is one example, but the possibilities are endless.  You could try to become really good at the piano or painting, lead an organization, or write a fantastic Substack about not giving legal advice.   

There is a lot in life worth doing.  

So, when should we press on?   

Finding your compass

This wouldn’t be such a problem if we had a bottomless well of time and energy.  However, we don’t have that luxury, so we have to decide how we spend our precious, fleeting time on Earth.  The good news is that if you choose to pursue a goal, you often have the option to change course if circumstances change or something else becomes a priority.  The bad news is that if you choose to pursue a goal, you often have the option to change course if circumstances change or something else becomes a priority.  

Knowing when to press on, there’s the rub.  The best approach I can offer is 1) understand your values and priorities as well as you can and 2) regularly check in with yourself to assess those values and priorities.  The hot tea of persistence is cooled in the saucer of judgment.

To use the marathon example, it’s something I consider almost every year around January 1, but only in part for Resolution purposes.  For the new year is the beginning of the training season for the Flying Pig Marathon in Cincinnati, which runs on the first weekend of May.  However, I have yet to do it for all the excuses reasons you’d expect: time, energy, it’s cold out, etc.  Basically, save for one year after law school, it just hasn’t cracked my list of top priorities to shoot for in any given year.  

If I tied a race to something that’s high on my value list, like friends or family, I could probably will myself through an ultramarathon (Ok, maybe that’s wishful thinking, but you get the point).  Usually I flirt with the idea primarily as some kind of personal achievement but that hasn’t been enough motivation yet.  That one year that I trained for the Pig?  A bunch of friends were running it too.  I got hurt during training lol.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  Don’t expect a marathon training guide in this Stack’s future.

If I’m being honest, sometimes I’ve found myself jealous of people who figure out what they want to do with their life at a young age.  I met a tattoo artist that knew he wanted to ink for a living when he was a little kid.  If you can figure something like that out, it makes things simpler and you can laser focus on exactly what you want to do or what you want to achieve.  Then it probably doesn’t even feel like persistence, you’ve essentially stripped away your choices.  But I haven’t met too many people who have committed themselves to a passion at such an early age.

Press on, children

This gets really difficult when you apply it to parenting, coaching, or teaching.  It’s one thing to pick a path and press on yourself, it’s another when you’re doing it to another human being.  And everyone is different in how they handle that kind of pressure.

One of the most difficult challenges of parenting, I’ve found, is when to push your kids and when to hold back.  Sometimes–strike that, often–kids need a push to do things they’d rather not do.  But they can do them and they’ll be better for it, dammit.  They can even learn a little persistence along the way.  However, we don’t want to be those parents who lean too hard on their kids for achievement, whether it’s in sports, school, or whatever.  

Sure, you want your kids to develop into capable, good human beings who will lead fulfilling lives, but you can’t be on their backs all the time.  Well, not if you don’t want them to be nervous wrecks or dependent on you forever.  Again, your parenting persistence must be tempered by your judgment.  That’s waaaaaay easier said than done.  

No really, press on?

Are persistence and determination alone omnipotent, as “McDonald’s” suggests?  I don’t dispute that they help overcome obstacles and push us to great heights, but omnipotent is hyperbole.  

The larger point of the quote is that persistence is an underrated virtue lying in the shadow of other characteristics like talent, genius, and education.  With that, I agree.  I’m sure many ideas and worthy projects have withered on the vine when a bit more persistence could have pushed them over the hump.  Perhaps I would have run that darn marathon already with some more persistence.  

However, persistence alone doesn’t guarantee a positive outcome.  It merely creates more opportunities for you to pull through or, at the least, puts you in the best position to achieve.  There is a healthy dose of luck that determines whether any given person or project succeeds.  Persisting allows more chances for the face of luck to shine upon you.

If you’re still trying to figure out where to persist, don’t give up.  If you know what you want and you want to see it happen, press on.