In this instant New York Times bestseller, Angela Duckworth shows anyone striving to succeed that the secret to outstanding achievement is not talent, but a special blend of passion and persistence she calls “grit.” “Inspiration for non-geniuses everywhere” (People). The daughter of a scientist who frequently noted her lack of “genius,” Angela Duckworth is now a celebrated researcher and professor. It was her early eye-opening stints in teaching, business consulting, and neuroscience that led to her hypothesis about what really drives success: not genius, but a unique combination of passion and long-term perseverance. In Grit, she takes us into the field to visit cadets struggling through their first days at West Point, teachers working in some of the toughest schools, and young finalists in the National Spelling Bee. She also mines fascinating insights from history and shows what can be gleaned from modern experiments in peak performance. Finally, she shares what she’s learned from interviewing dozens of high achievers—from JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon to New Yorker cartoon editor Bob Mankoff to Seattle Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll. “Duckworth’s ideas about the cultivation of tenacity have clearly changed some lives for the better” (The New York Times Book Review). Among Grit’s most valuable insights: any effort you make ultimately counts twice toward your goal; grit can be learned, regardless of IQ or circumstances; when it comes to child-rearing, neither a warm embrace nor high standards will work by themselves; how to trigger lifelong interest; the magic of the Hard Thing Rule; and so much more. Winningly personal, insightful, and even life-changing, Grit is a book about what goes through your head when you fall down, and how that—not talent or luck—makes all the difference. This is “a fascinating tour of the psychological research on success” (The Wall Street Journal).

A simple shift in thinking can change everything you believe about your own happiness. By the time we become adults, most of us have joined the religion of suffering, which preaches that unless circumstances are controlled, life will be a mess. We compare ourselves to others and speculate about an impossible-to-know future, holding out hope for an improved life through getting ahead, fulfilling passion, or finding true love. But the idea that happiness comes from putting effort toward altering one’s circumstances is harmful and backward. What if we instead learned to understand that circumstances can rarely be controlled, and that life is, and always will be, messy? From that starting point, we could learn to use our minds to create happiness despite life’s ever-changing circumstances and events. Life’s Messy, Live Happy by Cy Wakeman is about dramatically changing the level of happiness you feel in your daily life, by learning to disconnect happiness from external forces, stop worrying about the future, and realize that most of your negative feelings are about things that never even happened. Wakeman is a credible, relatable teacher—a business owner, mother, and community member who has lived her philosophy and achieved profound happiness and success in a crazy, messy life. Filled with concrete daily practices and true stories that are hilarious, painful, and poignant, this book will change everything: your perspective, your focus, and your energy level for everyday life.

Are you frustrated by your continued failure to follow through on your goals? Are you tired of getting excited about your New Year’s resolution or business idea only to find your enthusiasm dwindle and your efforts fade away after several months or even weeks? It has been proven throughout history that persistence—not talent— is the most valuable ingredient to accomplishing feats both big and small. In The Power of Persistence, author John Martin offers seven steps to breaking the cycle of starting and quitting. By following the simple formula presented in these pages, you can build a mindset of persistence and finally commit to your goals with the confidence that you will achieve them, regardless of the obstacles that arise. Learn more and enjoy the benefits of living with the power of persistence including: A set of mental tools to prepare for and push through lulls in motivation and productivity Enhanced concentration techniques Increased willpower in all tasks Learning how to turn pain and failure into motivation An elevated desire to continue working when you typically would stop An unbreakable sense of self-belief and commitment ….and more! Put a stop to the heavy feelings of defeat that come with giving up on yourself and your goals—once and for all! Once you build persistence into your character, you’ll leave the idea of quitting far behind as you achieve the dreams you once thought were impossible!

The Architecture of Persistence argues that continued human use is the ultimate measure of sustainability in architecture, and that expanding the discourse about adaptability to include continuity as well as change offers the architectural manifestation of resilience. Why do some buildings last for generations as beloved and useful places, while others do not? How can designers today create buildings that remain useful into the future? While architects and theorists have offered a wide range of ideas about building for change, this book focuses on persistent architecture: the material, spatial, and cultural processes that give rise to long-lived buildings. Organized in three parts, this book examines material longevity in the face of constant physical and cultural change, connects the dimensions of human use and contemporary program, and discusses how time informs the design process. Featuring dozens of interviews with people who design and use buildings, and a close analysis of over a hundred historic and contemporary projects, the principles of persistent architecture introduced here address urgent challenges for contemporary practice while pointing towards a more sustainable built environment in the future. The Architecture of Persistence: Designing for Future Use offers practitioners, students, and scholars a set of principles and illustrative precedents exploring architecture’s unique ability to connect an instructive past, a useful present, and an unknown future.

Have you ever started a project and never finished? Have you ever tackled a challenge only to give up halfway through? Have you ever lost your enthusiasm or confidence midstream? Of course that happens to everyone. The Positive Power of Practicing Persistence provides a powerful jump-start to get us moving again when we get stalled. Readers will walk away with a potent vaccination of never-give-up kind of persistence to employ in every facet of their personal and professional lives. The book opens with an inspiring account of the authors true life experience of leaving his homeland in India to migrate to a new country and culture. It is an inspiring diary of perseverance and determination to overcome all obstacles and barriers to achieve success in a challenging environment. In The Positive Power of Practicing Persistence, the author has selected fifteen inspiring stories of remarkable individuals who refused to concede their dreams. While some are well-known, others are relatively unknown. Inventors and entertainers, presidents and prisoners, saints and prophetsall are showcased in the book to illustrate that persistence can be applied by any person, anywhere and in any set of circumstances. Personal stories of Thomas Edison, Mother Theresa, Walt Disney, Nelson Mandela, Roger Barrister, J. K. Rowling, and Mahatma Gandhi are included. A couple of lighter stories featuring The Tortoise and the Hare and The Little Engine That Could add another layer of assurance that persistence wins on all levels. The final third of the book deals with the practical how-to-do-it methods to cultivate a greater resolve in our lives. These valuable how-to chapters engage readers in immediate action steps in how to persist in winning that dream job, getting the sale, achieving education goals, eliminating debt, and that all-elusive goal that plagues us allhow to persist in losing weight and getting fit! Other how-to chapters feature the art of teaching persistence to your children. Sprinkled through each chapter are quotes to motivate and inspire readers in their struggle to persist. Each chapter concludes with a key summary statement. The Positive Power of Practicing Persistence is a sure-fire way to reignite that fire within each of us to achieve everything we were designed to do.

A high level of literacy in both print and digital media is required for negotiating most aspects of 21st-century life, including supporting a family, education, health, civic participation, and competitiveness in the global economy. Yet, more than 90 million U.S. adults lack adequate literacy. Furthermore, only 38 percent of U.S. 12th graders are at or above proficient in reading. Improving Adult Literacy Instruction synthesizes the research on literacy and learning to improve literacy instruction in the United States and to recommend a more systemic approach to research, practice, and policy. The book focuses on individuals ages 16 and older who are not in K-12 education. It identifies factors that affect literacy development in adolescence and adulthood in general, and examines their implications for strengthening literacy instruction for this population. It also discusses technologies for learning that can assist with multiple aspects of teaching, assessment,and accommodations for learning. There is inadequate knowledge about effective instructional practices and a need for better assessment and ongoing monitoring of adult students' proficiencies, weaknesses, instructional environments, and progress, which might guide instructional planning. Improving Adult Literacy Instruction recommends a program of research and innovation to validate, identify the boundaries of, and extend current knowledge to improve instruction for adults and adolescents outside school. The book is a valuable resource for curriculum developers, federal agencies such as the Department of Education, administrators, educators, and funding agencies.

gricultural science policy in the United States has profoundly affected the growth and development of agriculture worldwide, not just in the A United States. Over the past 150 years, and especially over the second th half of the 20 Century, public investments in agricultural R&D in the United States grew faster than the value of agricultural production. Public spending on agricultural science grew similarly in other more-developed countries, and c- lectively these efforts, along with private spending, spurred agricultural prod- tivity growth in rich and poor nations alike. The value of this investment is seldom fully appreciated. The resulting p- ductivity improvements have released labor and other resources for alternative uses—in 1900, 29. 2 million Americans (39 percent of the population) were - rectly engaged in farming compared with just 2. 9 million (1. 1 percent) today— while making food and fiber more abundant and cheaper. The benefits are not confined to Americans. U. S. agricultural science has contributed with others to growth in agricultural productivity in many other countries as well as the Un- ed States. The world’s population more than doubled from around 3 billion in 1961 to 6. 54 billion in 2006 (U. S. Census Bureau 2009). Over the same period, production of important grain crops (including maize, wheat and rice) almost trebled, such that global per capita grain production was 18 percent higher in 2006.