It comes with many names - grit, fortitude, resilience, perseverance, heart, willpower, determination, drive. It comes with so many names because it's such an elusive, rare and valuable commodity.
Psychologist Angela Duckworth has devoted both her academic career and her new book, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, to the topic, noting that this trait, not raw talent, not intelligence, not past performance, is the best indicator of an individual's future success.
If Stacie Reis could bottle it, she could sell it by the truckload and make millions.
She made global headlines last year for surviving being trapped in her vehicle for 14 hours after it went off the highway as she
was driving to Kitimat to visit her dying grandfather.
The 27-year-old nurse straightened her own broken legs to keep the blood flowing to them and never lost faith she would be found.
Her battle didn't end there.
During the last year, she has endured 12 surgeries to rebuild her broken body and has suffered through difficult setbacks, including a bone infection so severe that doctors pondered amputating her leg.
The unrelenting pain, the ongoing treatment, the bad days and the steps backwards, the uncertainty of when, or if, recovery will ever come and what will it look like, can sap the souls of patients, nurses and doctors alike.
Yet a select few, like Reis, seem to be made of something more.
They experience the physicial and emotional anguish as much as anyone else but their ability to endure, to keep fighting, to never give up, sets them apart.
"There were all these different healing steps. It was always going forward," she said.
Framing the challenge as a journey towards a desired outcome is one way people like Reis overcome life's obstacles and reach their goals.
They are neither cheerful optimists nor gloomy pessimists.
They speak matter-of-factly of both their wins and losses, their spirits neither too high nor too low.
She stresses that she has challenges and struggles but she is not traumatized.
Those characteristics - and the individuals who possess them - are highly sought after in sports and in business. The main reason military and police organizations put recruits through strenuous boot camps is to uncover resilience. Skills can be taught, intelligence learned, wisdom acquired but the stubbornness to keep going, to keep improving, when mind and body are spent, separates the elite soldiers, athletes and individuals from mere mortals.
Dan Hamhuis, part-owner of the Prince George Cougars and longtime NHL defenceman, was hit so hard by a puck last December that it literally shattered his face. Doctors counted between 15 and 20 breaks in the bones around his cheeks, his eyes and his jaws, he recalled to Canadian Press. The injuries were so severe that he was initially fed through a syringe because the effort to suck on a straw could have caused more damage.
He stunned his teammates and fans with not only the speed of his physical recovery but with the mental and emotional grit he showed during his time away from hockey. Some speculated he might retire but he couldn't wait to get back to play the game.
It's not just injuries and illness that unmask resilience. Disappointment can, too.
Before Dustin Johnson won the U.S. Open earlier this year, he was widely recognized as the best golfer in the world to never win a major championship. His losses were as memorable as they were devastating. How does a professional in his prime three-putt from 12 feet on the final hole to lose the U.S. Open one year and then come back to win it the next? The history of professional sports is littered with gifted athletes whose careers went into tailspins after such agonizing defeats. Johnson is on a much shorter list of individuals able to use failure as both learning and motivational tools. He considers himself a better golfer as a result of his disappointing performance.
Reis is disappointed that she's still unable to walk on her left foot but that has only added fuel to her determination. She longs for the day when she is well enough to return to work in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at UHNBC, not only for her own benefit but to share the hard-earned knowledge and wisdom she has acquired during her own recovery with patients and families.
Whatever name grit goes by and however it manifests itself, witnessing the resilience and triumph of the human spirit is endlessly inspiring.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
