Developing Grit at Ignite

At Ignite, one of the things that we asked every athlete to do is imagine who they could be, both as an athlete and as a person. Although it is a goal to help athletes compete for as long as they desire, we know that most athletes don’t play past high school or college. However, we feel strongly that what you learn at Ignite transfers into life beyond baseball or softball. The biggest thing that we feel athletes are able to learn at Ignite is grit. There are lots of studies done showing grit as being one of the leading predictors of success in the real world. If you haven’t read the book Grit, by Angela Duckworth I highly recommend it.

According to Google, the definition of grit is: courage and resolve; strength of character. To put it more simply, grit is stick-to-itve-ness, even in the face of adversity. Grit is easier to develop when the person truly loves the thing that they are trying to improve at. This is why sports and other activities that people are passionate about are so important for young people to spend time on. Are they going to use the movement skills that they learn at ignite when they are a doctor, lawyer, or accountant? No. But they will use the strength of character that they developed here.

Grit is not a baseball/softball skill it’s a life skill. Things get hard, we know this. The training that we do at Ignite is also hard, but with the curriculum that we’ve put together, athletes do improve. And seeing that improvement is important, because to the athlete it creates a feedback loop where they believe that hard work, leads to improvement when they work on things that are designed well.

To me, this is more important than success on the field. It creates the framework by which people can construct how the approach life. The fact that we are working on a sport that they love is just a bonus.

Thanks for reading,

Kurt Hewes CEO and Founder of Ignite Baseball