Vince Lombardi built the Green Bay Packers into a five-time NFL championship-winning team and famously commanded, “Quitters never win, and winners never quit.” This is a famous motivational saying that you’ve likely heard many times.
Seth Godin is a marketing guru, blogger, and bestselling author. I love Godin’s stuff. I recently came across his book, The Dip. In the book, Godin challenges Lombardi’s viewpoint, stating that it is “bad advice.”
Instead, Godin offers an unconventional insight: winners do quit but choose the right moment and place to do so, allowing them to focus on areas where success is more likely.
Godin’s book revolves around the concept of “the dip.”
The dip refers to that critical juncture in any business, project, or task when you must decide to keep going or quit. It’s a decision point where we must choose whether to persist in the hope of overcoming the challenges or abandon the work and move on.
A critical problem, according to Godin, is our failure to recognize when a dip is actually a dead end.
Working through a dip can lead to personal growth, while a dead end is just that—a dead end.
Godin said, “Quitting holds importance because winning matters.” As a self-identified winner, I love that quote.
In relationship to this quote, Godin shares this insight:
“Extraordinary benefits await those who push slightly longer than others, and the gutsy minority who quit early and refocus their efforts on something new also enjoy exceptional benefits.”
In other words, leap smart or hold tight.
This resonates with me because it opposes settling, making do, or coping. His message is clear: persevere through the dip, aiming for greatness, or seek a different path.
“Mr. Inbetween,” as he terms it, represents the most common response to the dip — playing it safe, doing blameless work beyond reproach.
However, we know that coping wastes time and misdirects energy, never leading to exceptional performance or mission-based work.
This book reinforces my thoughts about mediocrity, which is an admitted fear of mine. I don’t mind being in a mediocre place with intentions of working out of it. But to settle into mediocrity is shameful.
Mediocre work rarely results from a lack of talent but rather from being stuck in a cul-de-sac. Coping squanders time and misdirects energy. If coping is your best, quitting is a better option.
And that requires an intelligent exit strategy.
In summary, my big takeaway from the dip book is:
Strategic quitting or persevering through the dip opens doors to exceptional achievements. Avoid settling for mediocrity. Embrace challenges, conquer the dips, and strive for greatness.
This relates to me because we’re faced with this decision at my day job. This relates to me as I look toward growing my freelance writing business.
Are you a Mr. or Mrs. Inbetween? Are you pushing through the dip? A strategic quitter? If we’re doing anything worthwhile, we’re all bound to face it.
