Mental Toughness Myth?

Vern Gambetta has a post on his blog today about mental toughness. His opinion is that mental toughness is a myth and a cliche'. Cliche' maybe but myth? Come-on! Mental toughness is the ability to ignore that little voice (internal or external) that says, "Ok it's time to quit. There's no need to keep going, that's good enough." Or it's the circumstance that threatens to break your spirit but you continue to press on. This character trait can and should be developed. In Vern's blog he also mentions mindfulness. There is a vast difference in my mind between bull headedness, which some would call mental toughness, and mindfulness. Mental toughness must be accompanied with a moral compass and the wisdom to know when you are being mentally tough and rightfully so or just bull headed and wrongfully so.

What is cusious to me is how Mr. Gambetta so highly relies on the facts of science in his training methods and principles but seems to be able to state his opinions as fact but appears to not have any scientific back support at all.

Is mental toughness a myth? No. Can it be developed? Yes Can it be mistaken for other less desireable character traits? Yes.

In the blog it was also suggested that one of the qualifications of mental toughness is "getting it done". I'm sorry but depending on the situation, not getting it done is not in direct coorelation to mental toughness. Someone can be extremely gifted with mental toughness but still falls short of "getting it done" whatever that means. However I would have to say that a certain amount of mental toughness is required when "getting it done" is achieved.