Late Bloomers: The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement

by Rich Karlgaard

road is crowded with early bloomers up ahead! By the time we late bloomers get there, the paths to opportunity are closed off. Late again, our life story! This can make us feel marginalized—or even ashamed.

“Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family: Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.”

Our culture inundates us with the idea that sticking with something, persevering through all challenges, overcoming the odds, and above all, never quitting is the secret to success.

While perseverance can and does produce success, there’s another side to the story: Sometimes quitting is the right decision.

The first problem with our cultural obsession with determination is that applying single-minded resolve to something that you don’t

really believe in actually makes you less effective.

The breakthrough finding of Baumeister’s study was that self-control—and its analogs like willpower,

determination, and perseverance—can be depleted. Determination is not simply a skill to be mastered or a habit to be developed. Instead, like overexercising a muscle to the point of injury, tenacity can fatigue us and break us down.

When we force ourselves to do things we’re not naturally inclined to do, or that don’t fit our passion or purpose in life, we pay for it with reduced motivation and drive.

Sunk cost is the money, time, or effort we’ve already put into a project or direction in life. The more and the longer we invest in

something, the more difficult it is to let it go. The sunk-cost fallacy is when we tell ourselves that we can’t quit because of all the time or money we’ve already spent.

It means that for every hour or

dollar we spend on one task or direction, we’re giving up the opportunity to spend that hour or dollar on a different, better task or direction. In other words, instead of focusing our efforts on something that isn’t working or fails to make us happy, we could be directing our energies toward something that might make us happier,

better suit our lifestyle, or help us make more money—if only we weren’t so worr...

In addition, Ariely suggests that we actually like suffering for things we love. In fact, we like it so much that if we suffer for something, we’ll decide we must love it!

As behavioral economics and psychology show us, the real waste is not in sacrificing

our past by quitting a failing endeavor. It is in sacrificing our future by not pursuing something better.

it’s just as

important to know when to drop something and shift direction as it is to know when to stick with something.

The ability to turn self-doubt into information and motivation is key.

The best strategy for managing self-doubt is compassionate honesty. We must learn to acknowledge our self-doubt

and to reframe it in a healthier, more constructive way. We must learn to see self-doubt for what it truly is: information—no more, no less.

Seen as information, pure and simple, self-doubt can change from a lifelong enemy into a trusted adviser that can help us rea...

Doubt about dangerous situations and sketchy propositions is a survival trait. Doubt is essential to our progress as a species.

Feelings of self-doubt may be more acute in those of us who haven’t yet bloomed, but it doesn’t mean we’re damaged, dysfunctional, or even unusual.

Self-doubt, properly harnessed, combats complacency.

A major difference between people who bloom and those still waiting to bloom is this: The bloomers don’t let self-doubt hold them back. Rather, they use self-doubt to help them improve.

Brooks found that we can frame anxiety as excitement by using simple strategies like self-talk (saying “You are excited!” out loud) or simple messages (“Get excited!”).

These framing messages allow us to channel our anxious energy into an opportunity mindset rather than a threat mindset.

People who learn to reframe are better able to solve problems, face challenges, and effect significant change,

making them better team members. Even more, skilled reframers make better leaders. Leaders are spokespeople: They create shared awareness, build consensus, focus attention, and motivate action.

This means we late bloomers who learn to manage self-doubt, who learn to frame challenges and obstacles as opportunities, are positioned to be not only better team members but better team leaders.

it’s about positively interpreting the challenges we face. It’s about expanding our possibilities to find better, more fruitful paths for moving forward. Reframing isn’t about turning off our negative thoughts. It isn’t about suppressing concerns or

fears. It’s not about turning untrue negative thoughts into untrue positive thoughts. Rather, it’s about stepping back and grounding our thoughts in a more positive framing of reality—both for ourselves and for the people around us.

That tool is self-compassion.

We can do this through increased self-compassion, a form of self-acceptance and internal empathy.

How does self-compassion work? A key is to acknowledge that we are good enough, no matter what society tells us.

And when we make mistakes, we also have an obligation to learn from them.

Because self-compassion helps create the

sense that it’s okay to fail, it motivates us to try again—and try harder.

Being able to say, Oh, this is normal, this is part of what it means to be human, opens the door to growing from the experience.

To be more self-compassionate, we need to notice that voice, acknowledge the criticism, and reframe it in a more self-compassionate way.

“Self-compassion is treating yourself with the same kindness, care and concern you show a loved one,” explains Dr. Neff. “We need to frame it in terms of humanity. That’s what makes self-compassion so different: ‘I’m an imperfect human being living an imperfect life.’ ”

Self-compassion is about learning to make friends with that critic, gaining some objective distance from it, and making it into a motivational tool.

To sum up: All healthy people have self-doubt, but we late bloomers often have too much of it. We make our situation worse by adopting unhelpful coping mechanisms, such as self-handicapping, to protect our self-image. But these coping mechanisms only take us further away from blooming. Self-efficacy is what thriving

late bloomers seek in order to convert self-doubt into a friend. Self-efficacy is our belief that we can accomplish a specific task with a reasonably positive attitude, make a plan based on facts, and bloom by cultivating self-talk, framing/reframing, and self-compassion. These techniques are foundational to late bloomer success,

leveraging many of the traits—curiosity, compassion, resilience, equanimity—t...

As work at every level gets more complex and collaborative, late bloomer traits like curiosity, compassion, and insight will become even more important. The skills that come with facing self-doubt—the ability to acknowledge mistakes, to support self-efficacy, to reframe challenges, and to show compassion—all support our

future need for innovation, continued learning, and improved teamwork. These late bloomer talents are future-proof skills that set us apart from many early bloomers.

In this genre, the maturing young man or woman realizes they possess an independent mind and are not necessarily the person their family and culture want them to be. But leaving one’s family and culture is never easy.