#755 How to Make Grit

In our last +1, we talked about how to make a pearl. Recall that the first step was to introduce an “irritant.”

We connected that gem origin story to another: No pressure, no diamonds.

We could say: No sand, no pearl. (And/or: No irritant, no pearl!!)

Today I’d like to spend a little more time talking about sand. Only this time we’re going to put it on some paper and talk about how to make some grit.

First, to be clear: I’m probably the least handy guy on the planet and I think I’ve used sandpaper precisely once in my adult life. (Hah!) (While recently building our Spartan set up for curious souls.)

But…

I do love the latent metaphorical wisdom in everyday things, so here we go… 🤓

Of course, sandpaper comes in different flavors. I love how those flavors are measured on a “grit” scale.

As the How Stuff Works folks put it: “For heavy sanding and stripping, you need coarse sandpaper measuring 40- to 60-grit; for smoothing surfaces and removing small imperfections, choose 80- to 120-grit sandpaper. For finishing surfaces smoothly, use a super fine sandpaper with 360- to 600-grit.”

That’s Today’s +1.

Without going into the finer details of sandpaper and allowing for some metaphorical freedom, let’s celebrate the fact that different projects require different levels of grit. The rough work? Lower grit will do the trick. But as you advance to the stuff you want super-polished, you’ll need 10 times (!!!) more grit.

Yep. That sounds about right for our metaphorical Optimizing.

What can use a little sandpaper in YOUR life?

Here’s to a toolshed packed with (a variety of!) grit.