Do Hard Things: Why We Get Resilience Wrong and the Surprising Science of Real Toughness

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This book is amazing. It changes your whole way of thinking. I believe that every single teen needs to buy a copy of this book. Thanks, Alex and Brett for challenging us!" The problem is, the Harris brothers wrote about things everyone has already heard a million times before. There's the message "if you're too scared to ever do anything, your life will waste away" pumped into just about every motivational book and movie, yet the Harris brothers acted like they were the ones to come up with it.

Life Changing. Two words that describe what this book has done for me. It has given me a new outlook...a better perspective on life and what I am to do. In Do Hard Things, Steve Magness beautifully and persuasively reimagines our understanding of toughness. This is a must-read for parents and coaches and anyone else looking to prepare for life's biggest challenges."-- Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers and Talking to Strangers and host of the Revisionist History podcast When you think of the word “tough,” who do you picture? Many people might think of a John-Wayne-type: someone who suffers silently, stoically ignores pain, and wouldn’t be caught dead talking about their feelings. But this popular image of toughness is deeply flawed. In fact, science and psychology find that stereotypically tough behaviors such as these are counterproductive to cultivating lasting resilience. It’s about time we redefined toughness! A really interesting and thought provoking book, which draws on research and stories from a huge range of spheres of life. I initially read this book to gain insights for my own distance running journey, and to consider how Magness's ideas relate to Jesus's/the Bible's view of toughness. As well as speaking into both of these areas, I will take away principles which apply to:

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As part of an experiment by the University of Wisconsin, two groups of people were subjected to a hot probe placed on the sensitive skin below the wrist. It sounds sadistic, but it was all in the name of science. See, the experiment was designed to measure how we experience pain. And while one group was selected at random, the other group consisted of elite-level meditators. Both groups gave the same rating to the intensity of the pain. But the meditators rated the experience as about three times less unpleasant than the non-meditators. In Do Hard Things, Steve Magness beautifully and persuasively reimagines our understanding of toughness. This is a must-read for parents and coaches and anyone else looking to prepare for life's biggest challenges."

As I said, it has a good premise. Who doesn't think that teenagers need to work harder and have more expectations of themselves. I'll be the first to admit that most of the time, I don't really expect anything of my kids other than they just exist. But, these guys were just over-the-top and so full of themselves and their accomplishments. Some of the descriptions just went on and on. If I had been reading the book at least I could have skipped ahead and not gotten so impatient with all of their superior explanations. Steve Magness has established himself as a leading voice in performance optimization and achieving one's personal bestness, arete as the Greek's say. In Do Hard Things, Magness questions longstanding beliefs that toughness is developed through hubris and infallibility. What he reveals is both hopeful and reassuring. Do Hard Things is essential reading for anyone looking to cultivate inner strength in a genuine and authentic way." I love the way it is written. It is crystal clear, to the point, interesting, funny, challenging, encouraging, and an easy read." This is an important book. And not just for those wanting to launch successfully into adulthood, but also for discontent twenty- and thirty-somethings who long to be catapulted into significance.” Set authentic goals for yourself. When you’re all about image, you set goals designed to impress other people: I’m going to run a marathon or I’m going to marry the most attractive partner I can find. But if these superficial goals don’t resonate with your actual desires, you’re unlikely to meet them.Purpose can help us overcome severe trauma. And sometimes, it is within severe trauma that we find our purpose. You may have heard of post-traumatic stress. Less well known is the phenomenon of post-traumatic growth. Individuals with post-traumatic growth experience renewed purpose and a greater appreciation of life after severe trauma. A study of POWs from the Vietnam War assessed the prisoners’ response to trauma. Counterintuitively, it showed that those who stayed in captivity the longest experienced the most growth. Their trauma was so severe that it shattered their worldview and their assumptions – in short, their facade. For some, this breakdown revealed a path to a new sense of purpose that allowed them to dig deep, persist, and survive. Now that is real toughness.

Do Hard Things is the textbook for anyone who works with teens; it's a philosophical and foundational must-read." Alex and Brett capture the passion and potential of our generation perfectly in this book. In Do Hard Thingsthey encourage us to go above and beyond the status quo in everything from schoolwork to serving the poor. This is a truly unique and sorely needed book."This book is one I would recommend to any of my friends, teen or not. If it doesn’t help you, you are lying.”