Last week I saw (from the first row, and in 3-D) Disney Pixar’s Up , an animated film about life, adventure, and friendship. The film certainly pulled on my heart strings in a very “other-people-matter” positive-psychology way. The film also speaks to this month’s theme of fun and play. [...]

My colleague John Buckley used to think of resilience as a suit of armour. Within the armour you feel invincible, safe in the knowledge that nothing can penetrate your defense system. It may be that resilience isn’t an extraordinary quality at all — that we all have the capacity to bounce back.

It was not an easy decision for his parents to let Blake leave high school and it continues to be a hard choice. They are attacked by critics —most of whom they’ve never met. If the Peebles had taken the expected path and insisted that their son stay in school, no one would be giving them flack – even if their son was bored, depressed or learning less. Many would tell them they were doing the right thing.

On a superficial level, it is easy to cast grit and mindfulness as polar opposites. One can mistakenly conclude that perseverance is an antonym for Kabat-Zinn’s concept of non-doing. To some, hooked on the adrenalin of achievement, of triumphing over one impossible goal and then another, the practice of mindfulness might seem like a colossal waste of valuable time better spent achieving something.

“You must retain faith that you can prevail to greatness in the end, while retaining the discipline to confront the brutal facts of your current reality.” The Stockdale Paradox – Jim Collins

Turns out it’s not enough to be pretty and witty–we now have to be gritty. Grit is getting some hot press at the moment, suggesting that if we want to be truly successful in life, we ain’t gonna achieve it without grit.

When did we start calling kids “self-motivated” if they responded to someone or something outside themselves? Doesn’t the word “self” mean that it comes from the individual himself? Is someone truly self-motivated if they are doing something to get a reward from someone else? Teens who are not top students may appear to be unmotivated when we look only at their school performance.

As we start the second quarter of 2009, our optional theme for April is Motivation and Grit. How can people help other people maintain high levels of motivation? What kinds of motivation exist, and how do they relate to achievement? What is grit, and how does it affect well-being and achievement?