Developing Unrelenting Drive, Dedication, and Determination

A Cognitive Behavior Workbook

Russell Grieger

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317288336
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psicología
• Subtopic: Terapia cognitiva conductual (TCC)

Distinct from other success or motivation booksthat emphasize skills, tactics, or pop gimmicks, Developing Unrelenting Drive, Dedication, and Determination digs deep into the theory and practice of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) to grow those qualities of character and personality that drive one to relentlessly do what is necessary to produce the great results one wants in life. Each chapter begins with an engaging discussion of that chapter's theme, replete with interesting real-life examples. Then comes a detailed step-by-step workshop that contains guided exercises that aid readers in building that character trait in others or themselves. Provided next are three powerful intensifiers to strengthen and integrate the trait into one's character structure. Following that are cogent suggestions to integrate that chapter's character trait into an organization's culture. Last, suggested readings are provided for those interested in further pursuing the building of that trait. Developing Unrelenting Drive, Dedication, and Determination is designed to instruct helping professionals in the REBT approach, to be a resource to work collaboratively with their patients or clients, and to be a sourcebook for the interested layperson.

CHAPTER 1

The Unrelenting Drive, Dedication, and Determination Factor

Great results are always within our grasp – but what does it take?

People sometimes attribute my success to my genius;

all the genius I know anything about is hard work.

Alexander Hamilton

Let me welcome you to Developing Unrelenting Drive, Dedication, and Determination: A Cognitive Behavior Workbook. I wrote this book for three audiences:

1. for my coaching, consulting, and clinical colleagues who want to add cognitive behavior strategies to their arsenal in helping their clients achieve the extraordinary results they want and deserve;

2. for individuals and groups to use in collaboration with their coach, consultant, or clinician in developing what it takes to sustain high effort and productivity;

3. for those individuals and groups who want to work on their own to build the drive necessary to achieve their treasured goals.

Now, why did I write this book? Simple. For over 35 years, as a clinical psychologist, an organizational consultant, and a positive psychology growth coach, I have been sought out to help people achieve something of high value. I believe I’ve been quite helpful in most of these cases. But, alas, I have sometimes bumped up against clients who, despite my best efforts, would simply not step forward and work with me to get to the promised land.

I think of Will, one of my clinical clients, who, despite the piercing pain of a severe anxiety disorder, refused to follow through with the between-session therapy assignments that would have brought him blessed relief. Then there was the major Midwestern bank that hired me to help shore up their leadership team’s abysmally low morale. Despite the spirited conversations that generated high-quality action strategies, their follow-through proved perfunctory and their performance continued on a slow, downtrending glide path. Finally, consider the CEO who asked me to coach him to be more positive with his management team, only to float along in his same old negative patterns when in the thick of things.

I tried everything I could think of to get these people to act. I saw to it that they learned the necessary skills. I worked to build up their confidence. I cajoled, reasoned, provided rewards and punishments, did cost/benefit analyses, even pleaded, all in an attempt to increase their motivation. Sometimes I felt I worked harder on their behalf than they themselves did.

Finally, after similar long and hard struggles with other recalcitrant clients, breaking through with some, failing with others, I knew I had to take a step back and rethink what I was doing. Through this process, I discovered three truths that hit me with more clarity than I’d ever had about anything before:

1. To produce any desired result – be it concrete (e.g., completing a novel, getting the lawn mowed, building a financial nest egg) or something less tangible (e.g., personal happiness, marital harmony, physical health) – is actually quite simple. A person must do whatever it takes to produce that result. Visioning won’t make it happen. Wanting and hoping certainly won’t. Even being motivated, in and of itself, won’t do the job. The only thing that will produce a desired result is for a person to act in such a way that the result is produced – no matter how long it takes, how difficult it may be, how many obstacles there may be in the path.

2. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But, I came to realize that, no matter what the desired result may be, nobody is capable of sustaining motivation 100% of the time. In other words, no matter how prized the result one wants, a person will be highly motivated to achieve it at times, but not so at others. Some people simply tire out. Others don’t really care that much to begin with. Still others are blocked by psychological forces stronger than their enthusiasm. Suffice it to say that, as a by-product of the vagaries of human existence, people’s enthusiasm for anything will wax and wane over time, as thusly will their efforts and hence their results.

No wonder my attempts to motivate my unmotivated clients failed. Like so many others, I had viewed motivation as an emotional phenomenon. I fell into the trap of trying to inspire them to be more aroused, caring, and excited to reach their goals. Like an athletic coach, I tried to fire these people up, arouse their passion, spur them to leave their blood on the field. But, these were the exact inner states that naturally rise and fall in all human beings over time.

3. Given this, I figured that, if I were to help my unmotivated clients relentlessly act to achieve their valued goals, I’d have to find a new approach to motivation. I’d have to discover the key to sustained action even when one is unmotivated. Motivation without motivation, I thought, that’s a hell of a concept.

These three truths, then, gave birth to Developing Unrelenting Drive, Dedication, and Determination. I asked: How can I get my clients to sustain the necessary action to produce their valued results, whether motivated or not? What does it take to do so, no matter what the intended result, the prevailing circumstances, or the feeling state? What is it that, once developed, will spur a person to relentlessly act, no matter how he or she feels?

Fortunately, the answers to these questions were available. Hundreds of research studies from all over the world provided the pathways. They are three in number and they are layered. Here they are.

THE HOW: HARD WORK AND DELIBERATE PRACTICE

Miracles sometimes occur, but one has to work terribly hard for them.

Chaim Weizmann

The most common explanation for why a certain few create great results is that they are blessed with some special talent or skill. Beethoven was born a genius, as was Thomas Jefferson, Sir Isaac Newton, and Bob Dylan. Despite this prevalent perception, Geoff Colvin, in his provocative 2008 book Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else, shares a vast body of literature across a wide array of fields that proves that this simply is not so. It seems that the idea that some people are born a world-class musician, salesperson, or athlete is a myth.

Indeed, Colvin’s research shows that what distinguishes people who achieve extraordinary results is what he calls “deliberate practice.” In addition to just plain old hard work, deliberate practice is characterized by several features:

1. It is an activity specifically designed to improve a particular performance.

2. It can be repeated over and over.

3. There is an opportunity for continuous feedback from a teacher, coach, or mentor.

4. It requires a high degree of focus and concentration.

5. It is not necessarily enjoyable or fun.

6. The earlier in life one begins to practice and the more one does it, the more likely one will be great at it.

Malcolm Gladwell, the author of Outliers: The Story of Success (2008), tells us that experts have concluded that 10,000 hours of such practice is required for true excellence. He quotes the noted neurologist Daniel Levitin, who writes:

The emerging picture from such studies is that ten thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world-class expert – in anything. In study after study of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, and what have you, this number comes up again and again. It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery. (p. 40)

To put flesh and blood to this, let’s take a brief look at three notables who most of us would agree achieved great things in some valued area of their lives:

• The Beatles. The Beatles burst into international fame seemingly overnight. Generally thought to be the best rock ‘n’ roll band ever, they conquered America in 1964 with such appealing ditties as “Love Me Do,” “Please Please Me,” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand.” But, guess what? They labored in obscurity for seven full years, beginning in 1957 when John Lennon and Paul McCartney first met. During those seven years, The Beatles performed live an estimated 1,200 times before they famously first appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show. These included five trips to the red light district of Hamburg, Germany where they were expected to perform seven days a week for anywhere from five to eight hours at a time. It was a full ten years of non-stop deliberate practice from their beginnings to their masterpiece albums, Rubber Soul, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and The Beatles (White Album).

• Senator Ted Kennedy. Considered to be one of the top two or three United States senators of all time, Ted Kennedy was called “the Lion of the Senate.” After his memorial service on Saturday, August 29, 2009, someone asked Susan Estrich, one of the senator’s former aides, whether it was his famous name or his popularity among his colleagues that was the key to his outstanding success. She acknowledged that he was well liked, even loved by those who knew him well. Yet, she went on to say that what made him such a great legislator was his ability to work longer and harder than his fellow senators.

• Steve Martin. Lore has it that Steve Martin burst into the national consciousness an overnight comedic genius. He first appeared on the radar in 1975 and, by, 1978, he was the busiest act in the history of stand-up comedy, drawing ecstatic crowds of up to 25,000 people in arenas across the country. What seemed like a blitzkrieg success story, though, was preceded by more than two decades of preparation. In his wonderful memoir, Born Standing Up (2007), Martin chronicled the many years of honing his craft until he mastered it. Describing the culmination of all this hard work and deliberate practice, he said, “The disparate elements I’d begun years before had become unified; my road experience had made me tough as steel, and I had total command of my material. But most important, I felt really, really funny” (p. 165).

To sum, there is a vast amount of scientific evidence across a wide variety of fields – sales people, athletes, inventors, musicians, and business people, to name but a few – that it is hard work and deliberate practice that distinguishes people who produce great results. This was true of The Beatles, Ted Kennedy, and Steve Martin. It seems reasonable to conclude that we can all produce the great results we want, however we define them, if only we are willing to put in the necessary work and practice.

But there has to be more than just hard work and deliberate, sustained practice. What would propel a person to devote himself or herself to such extreme practice? Given the investment one would have to make in terms of time and energy, not to mention the sacrifices with regard to family, friends, and personal pleasure, one has to wonder why one would devote so much of oneself in the pursuit of these results. Why would one persist on working so long and hard for a reward that may be months away, if not years or even decades? Read on.

THE WHAT: DEDICATION AND DETERMINATION

Genius is an infinite capacity for taking life by the scruff of the neck.

Katherine Hepburn

To delve deeper into the source of sustained effort, let’s refer to what I think is one of the most important business books ever written, Jim Collins’ Good to Great (2011). Comparing great to merely good companies, Collins discovered several distinct differences between the two, perhaps the most significant illustrated in Figure 1.1.

Great companies start with disciplined people who relen...