How To Achieve Greatness: 6 lessons from Marie Curie

December 10, 1903.

The president of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences gives a speech presenting the three awardees of the Nobel Prize in Physics.

For the first time, a woman is on the list: Marie Curie, 36 years old, who just finished her doctorate.

At a time when women weren't even allowed to go to university, this was particularly remarkable.

Unfortunately, her husband Pierre and herself couldn't attend the ceremony.

They were too sick and exhausted from their intense work in their lab, in poor working conditions, busy to discover radioactivity and probably suffering from symptoms due to high doses of radiation.

Height years later, Marie received a second Nobel Prize, this time in Chemistry.

She also developed and promoted the use of radiography, a new technique at that time, that helped cure more than one million soldiers during World War I.

She is also at the origin of Curietherapy, also called Radiumtherapy (the first form of radiotherapy), that helped save millions of lives since then (and still saves 3.5 million lives each year).

She was an exceptional example of greatness.

So what can we learn from such a historical character?

As a scientist-creator, I see many similarities between both scientific endeavour and creative work.

In both cases, it requires long-term hard work without any results or very little for months or years. Scientists and creators face daily doubts and failures.

They create and innovate without knowing if we will succeed or what will be the exact outcome of their effort.

Here are 6 lessons we can learn from Marie Curie to set ourselves up for greatness:

She faced many obstacles, first by being a woman aiming to have higher education and do science.

But also as a scientist working at the edge of the current knowledge. She never gave up.

Lesson: when things get hard, shift your mindset from “I don't want to do it anymore”, to "great, this means that I am making a lot of progress now"

She had to find new ways to solve the numerous problems she encountered. She couldn't succeed by doing what her predecessor did.

She had to take risks and explore new territories.

Lesson: if you do things the way everybody does, you will likely get the same results. Dare to take a new approach, using what you have learned in a different context. That's when innovation arises. And greatness too.

Marie Curie didn't settle for the easy way.

When half of France became occupied by the German army, most scientists followed the government to Bordeaux, in the free area.

She didn't and went back to Paris to contribute to the war by deploying mobile radiotherapy units using trucks ("Petite Curies") and 200 fixed units in field hospitals.

Lesson: achieving greatness doesn't happen if you follow the common path, the path of least resistance, the easy way. Think BIG and act to make it happen.

She never stopped learning and expanding her knowledge in different disciplines, from physics to medicine.

She was the first to receive two Nobel Prizes in different fields and the first female professor at the University of Paris.

Lesson: become a lifelong learner. Challenge your current knowledge or it will become obsolete. Continue to explore your curiosities to find unexpected connections that will help you create great things.

Marie Curie worked closely with her husband Pierre Curie, and they made important discoveries leading to the Nobel Prizes and the invention of radiotherapy.

She also collaborated with Claudius Regaud to create the Institut Curie, both a cancer research centre and a hospital.

(Fun fact: I did my PhD in this institute, in a room next to the original lab of Marie Curie, still intact. A nice little Museum to visit if you go to Paris.)

Lesson: while working by yourself gives you more control, collaborating will help you go further. And greatness means you need to go far.

Marie Curie faced many setbacks and failures throughout her career.

She ran out of material to extract the Radium, and out of money to buy chemicals. Even a war happened. But she never let them discourage her.

Lesson failure is an integral part of the creative process. It is not something separate from creating. You have to shift from seeing it as an obstacle to embracing it as an opportunity to learn and improve.

Now, there is much more to say about greatness and how to achieve it. But this will become too long for you to keep your focus.

Take time to digest and apply this knowledge. Because knowledge put into action becomes wisdom.

And wisdom leads to greatness.

I will continue to dive deeper into this in a later issue, so keep checking your mailbox if you are interested.

Be great,

Frank