“Expect anything worthwhile to take a long time,” a wise woman once said — a seemingly simple observation that is among the 7 most important things I’ve learned in the many years of doing what I do. This notion of doggedness is something countless admired creators have advocated — from Anthony Trollope’s advice to aspiring writers to Tchaikovsky’s admonition about work ethic — and it’s even something scientists have confirmed, in finding that “grit” is a greater predictor of success than intelligence. And yet, as a culture that worships at the altar of immediacy and instant gratification, we continue to romanticize the largely mythic notion of the overnight success, overlooking the years of struggle and failure that paved the way for some of humanity’s most admired and accomplished luminaries.

That mythology of genius is precisely what British filmmaker Adam Westbrook explores in his fantastic video essay series The Long Game — a feat of storytelling partway between Kirby Ferguson’s remix culture documentaries and Temujin Doran’s cinematic essays.

The first installment tackles the story of one of history’s most celebrated artists: Leonardo da Vinci, it turns out, got his big break at the age of 46 — elderly by the era’s life expectancy standards.

In the second installment, inspired in part by Robert Greene’s book Mastery (public library), Westbrook explores the notion of “the difficult years” — those rough stretches in a creative career that separate the ones who persevere and end up celebrated as “geniuses” from those who throw in the towel and sink into obscurity. From the seven years Marie Curie spent in poverty while researching radioactivity to the nine years of thankless writing Stephen King plowed through before selling his first novel, Westbrook reminds us that showing up day in and day out without fail is the surest way to achieve lasting success.

This celebration of youth, coupled with technology, has distorted our perception of time — the world moves faster, and so do our expectations. Today, we want success in seventeen levels, or seventeen minutes, seventeen seconds — and when the promise of something new and better is just a click away, who wants to wait seventeen years? But that’s the thing that connects all of these great people — they played the long game.

All of us have the brain, and the talent, and the creativity to join them. But now, right when it matters, do any of us have the patience?

Complement with this magnificent read on the difference between mastery and success and an important revision of the “10,000 hours rule” of excellence.

Thanks, Kirby