Vision, Control, and the Decline of Grit

Originally a thread on X/Twitter:

It’s widely believed that “grit” is one of the most important characteristics of successful people.

After 8 months in the web3 space I have a view that many of the problems in the NFT ecosystem are directly attributable to a lack of grit.

A few controversial thoughts:

I’ve written about how the lack of grit has impacted traditional stock and options investing. I feel like the NFT space needs to be added to this list.

I’m not trying to criticize well-intentioned NFT investors. I’m sharing a framework around toxic behaviors that are everywhere.

Like meme stocks did during the pandemic, NFTs are now suffering from YOLO behaviors. “You Only Live Once” is being used as a loose justification for pouring a more than comfortable amount of one’s personal net worth into highly speculative investments.

But why do people invest in highly speculative investments with their hard-earned savings? Why have NFTs attracted speculators even though the space constantly “REKTs” its participants?

There are many causes but I think “reduction in grit” is at the foundation of the issue.

To explain “reduction in grit” I have to lay down the framework for what I think “grit” is. There are dictionary definitions that fall flat (i.e. – Courage, Conscientiousness, Perseverance, Resilience, and Passion). I’ll pose a much cleaner definition.

My definition of “grit” consists of two major components.

Vision: A vision of a future state that one desperately wants to become real

Control: An unwavering belief that one can take actions that will result in the vision materializing

Vision + Control = Grit

This description of “grit” boils a complex trait into a simple form. For instance, world class athletes have grit because they want to win championships (Vision) and believe that practice plus diet plus exercise will affect the outcome (Control).

It also applies to Entrepreneurs. They see a better way of delivering a product/solution to a market (Vision) and believe that they can assemble the necessary resources and operationalize their solution to fill the market gap (Control).

But it also explains why so many talented people dismiss the idea of going into politics.

It’s not that these people wouldn’t be able to map out compelling solutions to our societal problems (Vision).

It’s that they don’t believe they can affect the outcome (Control).

So what happens when an entire society starts losing “grit”? Bad things.

We’re not living in the 1960s where there was a shared belief that as a country we could accomplish anything we wanted to and therefore had the “societal grit” to start and finish big projects.

We’re living in a time where people don’t believe that they can affect the inputs enough to kink the curve on outcomes. As a society we can’t agree on a vision for the future nor do we believe that our elected officials are working in concert to make our lives better.

It’s much easier for people to project where the current trends are heading than to imagine a world in which we put our country/world on a better trajectory. Climate? Wealth inequality? Working wages? Human rights? Ability to retire comfortably? Healthcare?

Without Vision and Control, our society is in a “reduction in grit” cycle.

And this leads back to the original premise that for many participants in the NFT ecosystem, their investing behaviors follow this trend.

Ask yourself how irrational it is for many NFT investors to prefer quick “mint-to-flip” or “follow the volume” opportunities to those that require patience because project teams are busy building and “value” will be generated over time?

How irrational is it if they have the social proof that other people just like them are doing it? How irrational is it when every once in a while a degen play works and when it works it REALLY works? And how irrational is it when it’s fun?

The alternative is to find places where individuals can focus their innate grit by investing in project teams that can articulate what they’re building (vision) and encourage community members to participate in the building process (control).

But it’s a major problem that most NFT teams don’t have or can’t share a compelling vision.

It’s a major problem that most NFT community members feel unheard and unappreciated.

And these problems lead them back to the toxic investing behaviors that are destroying the space.

It would be nice if NFT investors believed in and behaved as if the web3 ethos of “anything is possible” was real.

It would be nice if NFT investors believed that planting their hard-earned money with talented teams and being active community members led to success.

But most projects are the exception rather than the rule, so until project leaders become better at communicating their visions and encouraging participation, I fully expect the YOLO investing behavior to continue.

The crowd will celebrate degen wins even if the projects behind these wins ultimately collapse. Collateral damage will be justified as “part of the game”. And any mention of WAGMI will be laughed at by the winners who know where their wins are coming from.

What’s sad is that the problem may not be solvable because addictive behaviors are difficult (if not impossible) to break.

But this doesn’t mean that great NFT projects can’t be built by talented teams backed by patient NFT investors.

It just requires grit!!!!