When nothing seems to help, I go and look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.
-The Stonecutter's Credo, by Jacob Riis
No organization in the NBA personifies this mantra better than the San Antonio Spurs.
The most casual of NBA fans know their story: 20 years, 50 wins every single year, 10 Western Conference Finals trips and five championships under only one coach.
Ever since MJ bolted the Bulls, Gregg Popovich and his lame, boring, and masterful Spurs have bouldered through recent basketball renaissance dominated by the Lakers, the Pistons, the Lebrons, and now, the Warriors. No current team in any other US sport can match the Spurs’ longevity.
Longevity isn’t just an NBA pursuit; we all go through life with a constant desire of being great at things. At school, at the gym, at work, at home.
How Millennials Can Apply the Stonecutter’s Credo to Be Great at Things
‘Pounding the Rock’ is the motto for every single professional in the Spurs organization and they’re about it every day, in their attitude and approach to their mastering of the craft no matter their role. So you know it applies to more than winning basketball and stonecutting.
Pound the Rock when:
1) Discovering Your Calling & Landing the Dream Job
The whole world thinks millennials are entitled and can’t stick to their jobs when the going gets tough. Boomers and Gen Xers are mad that millennials want all that’s good in a job: good pay, challenging work, and a healthy work-life balance at a company that serves a great purpose.
When entering the corporate world, most of us don’t find the ideal job. Maybe the real-world work isn’t what you expected while you were studying it. Maybe the company culture isn’t what you expected while you interviewed. Or worse, maybe you just can’t find a job at all–even with perfect qualifications.
In these moments, keep going. Keep learning, go into work each day with a spongy mindset of understanding your colleagues’ roles and responsibilities. Dabble in different projects. Instead of filling in idle time with social media, read books and work-related articles. Ask a shit-ton of questions to anyone and everyone willing to answer them–and no, office gossip doesn’t count. Don’t judge how high or low this person is in the company’s hierarchy.
Keep pounding your rock until one day–it could be months later, it could be years later–you earn yourself the opportunity of a lifetime. The perfect work is out there, you just won’t find it via traditional job hunts. Don’t be so quick to quit jobs or change careers.
2) Paying off (All Kinds of) Debt
The Mrs and I got married in a traditional South Asian wedding in Oct 2016. It was easily the dumbest financial decision of our life, but hey, it’s tradition. You marry only once. Even though our parents helped us pay for half of it, we’re still paying off credit card debt, because South Asian wedding vendors in America overcharge for every single thing–that also is a new tradition.
While it’s been overwhelming at times, especially when other bigger life expenses arise, we’ve learned to pound the rock. Little by little, we’ve chipped away, paying off one (0% APR) expiring credit card after another, and we’re on track of being debt-free by next fall. In the process, keeping our heads high, focusing finances primarily on our new baby daughter, and taking on side projects has helped us stay on track.
They say experience is the best teacher, and no assignment teaches lifelong lessons as powerfully as debt repayment.
Long-term debt for millennials is as inescapable as Chiberian temperatures every winter. You’re going to get bombarded, so you might as well prepare for it, and weather through it.
3) Having a Baby (and Building it)
3 trimesters. The actual baby delivery process. Bringing the kid home. Going through the motions each and every hour, day, and week. Feeding her, dressing her, hypnotizing her to sleep. Helping her cope with spit-ups. Tummy time. And a hundred other little moments that challenge parents.
As much as mom and dad want to see their baby sleep through the night, sit and walk upright, and laugh, talk, and play all right, I’ve learned you shouldn’t rush through the process.
Enjoy the boring details, breathe through the anxiety, and keep pounding the rock, knowing full well that she’ll do all these things in time, in her own time. Chip away moment by moment, and you’ll discover things about your kid that Boomers and Gen Xers before us missed out on, simply because they lacked the education, the technology, and the parenting science that millennials are armed with today.
