What in the world is Concerted Cultivation?

I recently read the book "Outliers" by Malcom Gladwell and I found out that he could see the power of a watchful mother. Outliers are a statistical anomaly. It's the town that never has heart attacks, it's the kid who grows up to be worth $60 billion dollars, it's the band that changes the musical world and in part it's due to watchful mothers. Watchful mothers can create outliers simply by doing what they do best - supporting and helping their children become the best people they can be. He calls it concerted cultivation.

Here is part of an answer that was on his website www.gladwell.com on why he wrote his book.

In the case of Outliers, the book grew out a frustration I found myself having with the way we explain the careers of really successful people. You know how you hear someone say of Bill Gates or some rock star or some other outlier—"they're really smart," or "they're really ambitious?' Well, I know lots of people who are really smart and really ambitious, and they aren't worth 60 billion dollars. It struck me that our understanding of success was really crude—and there was an opportunity to dig down and come up with a better set of explanations.


... in order to understand the outlier I think you have to look around them—at their culture and community and family and generation. We've been looking at tall trees, and I think we should have been looking at the forest.

I think about Mary Ball Washington - not letting George go to sea and helping him get a job surveying. This is concerted cultivation - without expensive lessons. It doesn't have to take money, it takes caring, praying and acting.

My sister Becky recently had one of her childhood dreams fulfilled, but by her babies (a 14 year old son and 11 year old daughter). They got GOOD parts in their school plays. They got to be on the stage with only a few other people and actually got to say lines. This didn't happen just because her children are super talented, she helped them, she coached them and she made it possible for them to go to the auditions, rehearsals and all the whatnot that you have to do when your child performs. Her children fulfilled her dreams because she made sacrifices for them.

So what we do REALLY matters. As a watchful mother we can set the stage for our child to be everything God needs them to be ... or not.