I grew up in the U.K., currently live in the U.S., and the differences between these countries fascinates me. One difference that strikes a chord is in the attitude to persistence and giving up.
In the U.S. self-gurus aplenty advocate the importance of staying power: “never give up”, “it’s just when most people quit that things change for the better”, “winners never quit and quitters never win”, etc. I know many who subscribe to this mindset, push through their pain… and end up with a longer term injury than if they had ‘given up’. Giving up isn’t bad, just as failure isn’t bad, not if you see it in the right light.
The drive to never give up is also strong in the U.K. I know this because we grow up with the words of Winston Churchill ringing in our ears:
Never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.
Sir Winston Churchill (29 October 1941, to the boys at Harrow School)
And so the difference is not in the importance, or value, or commitment to persistence but rather the mindset around it. The U.S. vibe around persistence feels more like an irresistible force, and in the U.K. it feels more like the immovable object. Maybe that’s a byproduct of our respective size and power.
Whether you’re force or object, it’s when we take a binary approach to giving up that we get into trouble. It’s not that simple.
- If you are running a marathon and you have a searing, shooting pain going through your leg, you’re not weak to stop, you’re smart.
- If you are in a job that makes you miserable, you’re not weak to leave, you are prioritizing long term happiness and personal effectiveness over some irrelevant and incorrect attitude to failure.
- When events change, or when new information comes to you, it’s ok to change your mind. In fact you absolutely SHOULD reassess your situation.
This is what I’m left with:
Be bloody-minded in the pursuit of your dreams and values, but be like water when finding your path to realize them. If water hits a massive boulder it goes sideways, or even backwards, until it can find a new way forward.
Bruce Lee
