Mindset

The New Psychology of Success

by Carol Dweck

Buy here.

Briefest Precis

“In this book, you’ll learn how a simple belief about yourself—a belief we discovered in our research—guides a large part of your life.

In fact, it permeates every part of your life. Much of what may be preventing you from fulfilling your potential grows out of it.

No book has ever explained this mindset and shown people how to make use of it in their lives. You’ll suddenly understand the greats—in the sciences and arts, in sports, in business—and the would-have-beens. You’ll understand your mate, your boss, your friends, your kids. You’ll see how to unleash your potential—and your children’s.”

Fixed Mindset vs. Growth Mindset

“For twenty years, my research has shown that the view you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way you lead your life.

It can determine whether you become the person you want to be and whether you accomplish the things you value. How does this happen? How can a simple belief have the power to transform your psychology and, as a result, your life?”

“Believing that your qualities are carved in stone—the fixed mindset —creates an urgency to prove yourself over and over. If you have only a certain amount of intelligence, a certain personality, and a certain moral character—well, then you’d better prove that you have a healthy dose of them. It simply wouldn’t do to look or feel deficient in these most basic characteristics.”

“In this mindset, the hand you’re dealt is just the starting point for development. The growth mindset is based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts. Although people may differ in every which way—in their initial talents and aptitudes, interests, or temperaments—everyone can change and grow through application and experience.”

Or as Emerson put it –

“Sow a thought and you reap an action; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.”

Often paraphrased as –

belief → thought → action → habit → character → destiny.

…and as we used to believe that we were the centre of the Universe, and Galileo and Copernicus got in no end of trouble for suggesting otherwise, proving that beliefs can be changed, Beliefs as the root is important to me.

It doesn’t matter how much Mojo you think you were born with, your potential is unknowable, until you push yourself and the boundaries of belief.

VERY IMPORTANT!

“Do people with this mindset believe that anyone can be anything, that anyone with proper motivation or education can become Einstein or Beethoven?

No, but they believe that a person’s true potential is unknown (and unknowable); that it’s impossible to foresee what can be accomplished with years of passion, toil, and training.”

“…years of passion, toil, and training.” is what puts most folks off, it would appear?!?

And “If not you, then who?”

Fixed mindset = proving you are smart, talented, gifted, etc, and this is how you validate yourself. Preferably immediately, and without effort. If you have to make an effort, it proves you are not enuf already. Any given performance is a sign of ultimate potential. Failure, therefore, definitively proves you are not good enuf, so must be avoided at all costs.

Growth mindset = whatever baseline abilities you have are a good starting point, and “…years of passion, toil, and training” will help these grow towards fulfilling your potential, which is unknown & unknowable. Diligent, patient, persistent and playful work will produce incredible progress in the long, accumulated, compounded run? A lifelong Hero’s Journey towards Self Actualisation.

“Malcolm Gladwell, the author and New Yorker writer, has suggested that as a society we value natural, effortless accomplishment over achievement through effort.

We endow our heroes with superhuman abilities that lead them inevitably toward their greatness. It’s as if Midori popped out of the womb fiddling, Michael Jordan dribbling, and Picasso doodling. This captures the fixed mindset perfectly. And it’s everywhere.”

…and it’s horseshit, As Dweck tells us: …

“Do you know that Darwin and Tolstoy were considered ordinary children? That Ben Hogan, one of the greatest golfers of all time, was completely uncoordinated and graceless as a child? That the photographer Cindy Sherman, who has been on virtually every list of the most important artists of the twentieth century, failed her first photography course? That Geraldine Page, one of our greatest actresses, was advised to give it up for lack of talent?”

I’m 56, and I don’t know who half of those folks are! So, there is a further extensive list of folks generally perceived to be “Gifted” who actually just worked harder on their craft than pretty much everyone else. Including, but not limited to, Tiger, MJ, Beckham. I may have to do a page on each, when time allows. And the fact that you know who I mean from one word or letters shows they were among the Greats, and thru Graft not Gift. (Muhammad Ali and Babe Ruth, Mia Hamm and Jackie Joyner-Kersee)

“Genius is made, not born.”

Michael Gelb – How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci 

It is always a choice.

Your choice.

Loving What We Do

“The growth-minded athletes, CEOs, musicians, or scientists all loved what they did, whereas many of the fixed-minded ones did not.

Many growth-minded people didn’t even plan to go to the top. They got there as a result of doing what they love. It’s ironic: The top is where the fixed-mindset people hunger to be, but it’s where many growth-minded people arrive as a by-product of their enthusiasm for what they do.

This point is also crucial. In the fixed-mindset, everything is about the outcome. If you fail—or if you’re not the best—it’s all been wasted. The growth mindset allows people to value what they’re doing regardless of the outcome. ”

Love what you do, it makes it all a whole lot easier.

And again, it is a choice, and thus within your sphere of control & influence.

Stated otherwise & eloquently by Ayn Rand, George Leonard, Tom Morris.

“How do you act when you feel depressed?

Do you work harder at things in your life or do you let them go? Next time you feel low, put yourself in a growth mindset—think about learning, challenging, confronting obstacles. Think about effort as a positive, constructive force, not as a big drag. Try it out.”

Nobody is happy all the time.

This too shall pass.

Embrace & learn from the lows as well as the highs.

Help the funk pass more quickly, efficiently, and more purposefully by nudging it with a “Funk it, this is what life is all about, I’m learning & growing, what an absolute bloody privilege it is to be alive, soon I won’t be, and then I’ll have funk all to worry about!” kind of approach & attitude.

Win or learn.

Look back on your life. It wasn’t the good, easy, comfort zone stuff that made you who you are. It was all the “Bad” stuff that forged you. Enjoy the process for what it is, the forging of the steel, the pressure to turn coal into diamonds, your call entirely, as always.

Embrace Your Failures

“Michael Jordan embraced his failures.

In fact, in one of his favorite ads for Nike, he says: “I’ve missed more than nine thousand shots. I’ve lost almost three hundred games. Twenty-six times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot, and missed.” You can be sure that each time, he went back and practiced the shot a hundred times.”

To watch it, click here.

Every “Failure” is a learning & growth opportunity, it might not be your preferred outcome, but it is an outcome nonetheless. Apparently the outcome the Universe preferred, so get over it fast & alchemise the growth,.

Surely we need that contrast, to experience the “Bad” in order to truly be able to savour the “Good”?

Teddy Roosevelt put it succinctly too.

Put (Concrete) Foundations Under Your Castles in the Air.

“Think of something you need to do, something you want to learn, or a problem you have to confront.

What is it? Now make a concrete plan. When will you follow through on your plan? Where will you do it? How will you do it? Think about it in vivid detail.

These concrete plans—plans you can visualize—about when, where, and how you are going to do something lead to really high levels of follow-through, which, of course, ups the chances of success.

So the idea is not only to make a growth-minded plan, but also to visualize, in a concrete way, how you’re going to carry it out.”

Woop it. Watch Gabrielle talk you thru the process.

Make a detailed plan with the when, where, and how you’re going to rock it.

Want evidence?

“A broad and persuasive array of studies confirms that specificity of timing and precision of behavior dramatically increase the likelihood of success. The explanation lies once again in the fact that our conscious capacity for self-control is limited and easily depleted. By determining when, where and how a behaviour will occur, we no longer have to think much about getting it done. A series of experiments have confirmed this pattern…

A group of drug addicts were studied during withdrawal—a time when the energy required to control the urge to take drugs severely compromises their ability to undertake nearly any other task. As part of the effort to help them find employment post-rehabilitation, one group was asked to commit to writing a short résumé before 5:00 P.M. on a particular day. Not a single one succeeded. A second group was asked to complete the same task, but also to say exactly when and where they would write the résumé. Eighty percent of that group succeeded.

by James E. Loehr – The Power of Full Engagement

19 out of 20 of them are still using drugs, but that is a different conversation.