“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.”
I lived the first three decades of my life with a fixed mindset.
In my youth I avoided challenges and often took the path of least resistance. As a young adult I would respond defensively to criticism without appreciating the intent of the other party or the message they were trying to convey. I felt threatened by the success of others and I believed that there was no point in trying to learn them as my situation was too unique for such lessons to apply.
At just 30 years old my health had deteriorated significantly from years of stress and a sedentary lifestyle. One evening, as I found myself out of breath after carrying my oldest daughter up a flight of stairs, I got to thinking about my father who had experienced a heart attack at just 50 years old.
Suddenly, I realized that I was on a very dangerous path.
In that very moment I experienced a paradigm shift. I realized that there had to be a better way to live and I owed it to my family to figure it out. I was ready to embrace the growth mindset.
I began to believe that ability could be developed through effort and my first challenge would be to improve my cardiovascular health. Over the next 18 months I lost more than 70 pounds through a combination of diet and exercise. I realized the power of persistence and learned from both the successes and failures of others to chart my course.
And then my thirst for enlightenment expanded into entrepreneurship.
I pursued networking opportunities and joined a peer group called Entrepreneur’s Organization. I leveraged the experience of a brilliant Minnesota based entrepreneur to implement the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS) which is outlined in Gino Wickman’s book Traction. These two discoveries, along with the amazing people on the MAP team, served to be the catalyst for tremendous business growth after 3 long years of stagnation.
I can only imagine where I would be today had I experienced my shift to the growth mindset just a few years earlier, but I am eternally grateful to have made the shift at all.
Adopt a growth mindset and you’ll see how bright the future can be.
“If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning. That way, their children don’t have to be slaves or praise. They will have a lifelong way to build and repair their own confidence.”
Graphical Representation
Ameet Ranadive utilized the following infographic in this Medium article to explain how people with each of the two mindsets might approach a situation or challenge:
Further Reading
From the author’s website for Mindset: The New Psychology of Success:
Mindset is a simple idea discovered by world-renowned Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck in decades of research on achievement and success—a simple idea that makes all the difference.
In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talent instead of developing them. They also believe that talent alone creates success—without effort. They’re wrong.
In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Virtually all great people have had these qualities.
Teaching a growth mindset creates motivation and productivity in the worlds of business, education, and sports. It enhances relationships. When you read Mindset, you’ll see how.
