The Most Valuable Mindset
3 Considerations for Finding the Best Mindset I know
What is the mindset of the greatest people of all time? How can I change ours to become a bit more like that?
If you have nearly a little passion for self-development, this question has popped into your mind at least once.
However, the idea that we can change our mindset to obtain better results in our life sometimes results vague and far from us.
But yet, at the same time, it can be very close.
A Mindset Lesson From a Kid — Digression
During the last month, I had some opportunities to spend some time playing with a 6-year-old kid.
We played different games, and almost all the time it was just me against him.
I didn’t know how to act in these situations: “Should I let him win all the time? Should I beat him in every game?”
After a little thought, my plan was clear: I would have let him win, but only with some fair enough difficulties. He should have tried at least a little, and only then I would have let him win.
At every win, I would have applauded him as a reward.
Why did I decide this? Because when I was a kid this was the way I wanted to play. I wanted to try — but always and only if I win all the time.
Then I asked friends, colleagues, and parents what behavior would have been more appropriate according to them:
“I don’t know”, “Mmm I also wondered that but I don’t have an answer”, “I beat my kid all the time, he should deserve to win”...
These were just a few answers I received.
Then I wondered: is my behavior with the kid showing my mindset? Do I always want to win? Am I teaching my own mindset to the kid right now?
Some time ago, I read a book called: “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success” by Carol S. Dweck.
I didn’t get much at the beginning about what the author meant by static and dynamic mindset.
I mean, I got it theoretically speaking, but I realized only when I saw some examples in real life. Here is what I learned.
1. Reward the Effort
I don’t know if it happens to you, but when I see a kid hitting the ball correctly, making a good construction, and winning the game, I say:
“Oh good! That was awesome”
Do you do it? Then bite your tongue.
As Carol says in her book, if you reward the kid when he achieves something you are transmitting the following message:
achieving something = good = I’m happy/proud of you.
This idea after a while sticks into the kid’s mind, and he might develop a mindset that likes only the things at which he is good.
He might be scared to try new things when he grows up because he doesn’t want to fail/make you disappointed.
If rewarding excellent achievements seems to be wrong, what should we do?
We should consider rewarding the effort.
For example, if you are playing football and the kid is shooting very well with his strongest foot, don’t applaud him because he is good at it, but first tried to convince him to switch foot and then applaud him for the effort he did in changing it.
In other words, to encourage the growth of a dynamic mindset we should reward the kid when he does an effort to try something new, different, and difficult.
Doing this, you pass the message:
“I’m proud of you because you try, not because of the result”.
Carol Dweck is advertising this type of way of teaching the kids in her book. However, I think that we can be a teacher also for ourselves.
We shouldn’t stop to teach ourselves this mindset.
2. There is No Good nor Bad
This thought came from me, and I think this belongs to another type of mindset, that I refer to as: “The Growing Mindset”.
But first, let’s answer the question: What is a good result for a person with a dynamic mindset?
Depends on the amount of effort. You can consider a good result if you tried to do an exam you were scared of, even if you failed.
This way of thinking is relieving and liberating. This mindset helps you to avoid the pain that 99% of people try when they fail. And you can try all the things you like without being scared of the judgment of others and yourself.
However, what happens if you try and fail again? Should you applaud yourself for the effort again?
Unfortunately, Carol doesn’t provide us with a solution in her book, but this question made me think about another variant of this mindset: the already quoted “Growing Mindset”.
The philosophy under this mindset is the following: in life, only facts exist.
Some people may judge them positively, and some negatively. For you, the only thing that matters is: “Did I learn something from it?”
If the answer is “Yes” keep this important lesson for you. If “No” forget what happens and go on.
At this point, every failure will mean an important learning experience for you that you will apply to avoid the same situation in the future.
Imagine that every event that happens in your life matter only if you learn something from it. You can go beyond the pain finding a meaning underneath.
This way of thinking helped me a lot in my life to pass bad moments. I gave some meaning to the difficult events that happened to me, and found the most valuable lessons of my life.
3. You Mindset is Your Reality
It’s interesting to see how many people start a sentence like “The reality is…” or “The truth is…”
For example: “The truth is that she doesn’t like you enough”, “The reality is that in this company they don’t consider you as a person but as a number”, and so on and so forth.
I think this is just a way to express opinions. There is no undeniable truth. Everyone sees things with their own eyes.
Life is just about objective facts. The reality is our interpretation.
For example, if we see one person smiling at us, based on our experience we would say that she/he likes us. On the other hand, we might think that she/he laughing at us because we are weird or ugly.
Depending on the scenario, our reactions, emotions, and thoughts would be completely different: in the first case, we might feel good and appreciated, and our confidence might grow; in the second case we might feel humiliated, less confident, and we might have a totally different reaction.
What is our reaction based on then? It is based on our experience, our values, our relationships, and our beliefs. All of this creates our Mindset.
In other words, the reality we live is strictly connected to our Mindset. And each person in the world has a unique Mindset (=interpretation of life).
Conclusion
In my opinion, the Mindset is one of the most important things we own.
It can really make the difference in having one type of thinking over another one to have an happy or unhappy life.
Our future is strictly connected to our Mindset.
That’s why for me it’s very important to find one that I like.
Sometimes to change the reality where we live, we can just simply change the interpretation we give to the events.
