On Mindset and the Difference Between Resilience and Grit
Getting into structured training was the biggest improvement of my quality of life I have ever made. On a recent episode of Marcello Seri's excellent It's Not Just Numbers podcast the other guests and I spoke about it at length.
Structured (endurance) training is based on a few basic principles such as periodization, progressive overload, specificity and individualization. With the help of these principles, you can design a training plan and adapt it according to circumstance. But training is more than following a training plan, the psychological component is hugely important. And recently, I have tried to learn more about the psychological dimension as well, not least because all of it is directly applicable to my day job as a scientist, mentor and educator.
Amber Malika's Be A Good Wheel podcast is a great resource for that. She is a former athlete, a swimmer-turned-professional-cyclist, with a clear talent for podcasting. Her episode with Dr. Omit Fotuhi centered on the topic of mindset, i. e. how we react psychologically to challenges, obstacles and failures. One important distinction is between fixed and growth mindset. People with a fixed mindset tend to perceive the limits of their ability as immutable and innate. In contrast, people with a growth mindset will tend to view the boundaries of one's ability as malleable, one can expand what one is capable of by trying and working on it. Of course, people do not fall into neat black-and-white categories and it is not as simple as “let's all adopt a growth mindset everywhere”. But experience with sports and e. g. playing an instrumet can help to open up new possibilities. Both activities engrain simple lessons like “you get better with practice” and that “your current limitations do not define you”. Those little factoids sound mundane and like cheap inspirational quotes. What makes all the difference is the experience of putting them into practice.
Recently, a student of mine who had previously struggled with one of my classes, passed and was significantly above average. I leaned on their experience in sports to mentor them, and since they were willing to put in the effort, they passed. “Practice and you get better.” is more convincing if you experience it for yourself. In my conversations with them afterwards, I had the impression they were even a bit intimidated by their own success as it challenged their self-image of “being bad at math”.
The podcast also discussed two other notions, namely resilience and grit. Typically, both have a positive connotation. But Fotuhi clearly distinguishes the two and recommends more emphasis on resilience. According to him grit is the ability to lean into difficulties. On its face, that sounds very positive — and it can be. However, it can become problematic since grit is about mobilizing the resources within ourselves to overcome obstacles. In contrast, people who are resilient also mobilize their entire support network — friends, colleagues, family, mentors and other resources — to tackle a problem. In the long run, that gives resilient people more to work with than just grit.
I hope I can put these learnings into practice soon.
