Grit And Mindet Analysis

Being a leader is something we’ve heard about for most of our lives and is something that a lot of us have likely experienced to some capacity. Far more goes into being a leader than what most people would think, but the terms “grit” and “mindset” are quite often overlooked when simply discussing leadership in the context of school organizations or church groups. Most of the time, these terms don’t hold much significance until they are defined in terms of one’s personality and their strengths. Grit and motivation go hand-in-hand in that being gritty is characterized in part by the motivation to pursue success and expound upon one’s knowledge base. Mindset can also be closely related to these concepts; the type of mindset one has can easily …show more content…
It is important to grasp these concepts in order for an individual to maximize upon their innate, or learned, abilities especially in the context of being a leader. As stated in their research design article, Katherine R. Von Culin characterizes grit as being able to pursue a long-term goal while maintaining a positive attitude and a dedicated mindset (Von Culin, Tsukayama, and Duckworth, 2014). It is worth noting the emphasis that, in my opinion, is heavily placed upon the idea of zeal and hard work. This truly embodies grit; a burning desire to strive for the upmost and the highest in whatever task is at hand and a dedicated heart, mind, and soul to that same cause. Grit is encompassed by a mindset that giving up on a goal isn’t an option. This is not only an important trait for anyone seeking to be a leader to possess but is also a valuable trait for anyone wanting to work in healthcare, particularly occupational therapy. It is important for an occupational therapist to have grit that is apparent to their patients. In that sense, hopefully their motivation and positive attitude will rub off on them to allow for more optimism in their therapy sessions and also in …show more content…
Gunderson’s research article discusses the effects that different types of praise and encouragement has on a child and how that affects their mindset several years down the road. This study found that the types of praise a parent provided to their child, whether phrases like “great effort!” or “you’re so smart”, had a lasting effect on children and their motivational framework. Children that were praised in terms of their effort were found to have more grit and view intelligence as an unfixed entity, whereas children that were praised based upon their performance were more likely to believe that their intelligence levels were fixed (Gunderson et al., 2013). This study demonstrates how grit and mindset are very much related. The individuals who believed that intelligence is not fixed are likely to have more grit and therefore their mindset is focused more on expansion of their intelligence rather than settling for their “predetermined” level of