Chapter 310

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Maintaining enthusiasm is the crucial piece. The difficult piece. The every long boring day piece. This is where we falter and fall short of our Great. I see this happen in my clients, co-workers, friends, enemies, and frienemies. All the Greats in my life, all the parts I am most proud of, took a huge amount of enthusiasm.

But when enthusiasm has to last more than a short while (and this is determined by the task or goal or project at hand, because a “short while” when doing something tedious is much shorter than a “short while” when doing something fun), then it morphs into perseverance. Enthusiasm is the honeymoon experience, perseverance is the gas in the long haul tank. Most of us are capable of short bursts of intense enthusiasm. Repeatedly.

Far fewer of us appear to be capable of sustained enthusiasm, or as I pointed out morphed-perseverance - in for the long haul. In other words, I have never experienced enthusiasm that can survive long enough to accomplish something great. I have experienced strong enough enthusiasm to get me started down some solid paths that eventually led to something Great. But the feeling of enthusiasm had long waned by the time we got to Great.

Enthusiasm is the rocket fuel that provides lift-off, the super energy burst that defies gravity, that gets it moving, that provides momentum. But most regular folks require grit, perseverance, stubbornness, whatever, to carry them through to completion. Most of us are not Emerson, who, evidently, could be sustained purely on enthusiasm.