Prove Me Wrong: Age a Barrier to a Growth Mindset
“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves” Viktor E. Frankl.
When I met Daniel in 2016 he was over his 40’s and my first impression of him was that he had a perfect life under control. He is one of the smartest person I’ve ever met, he has this great job where people listen to him and constantly follow his directions, he often goes on family trips around the world, and his beautiful daughter does phenomenal in school. Of course at my twenties I asked myself, How can this human being have this perfect control over life? Is that even possible? How long did it take him to get there? Can I get to have the same life at that age? I have to admit that I was jealous of his perfect and easy life. However, it wasn’t after a couple of years ago when I realized that this perfect life that Daniel had was not all roses. As everyone else, Daniel had ups and downs, and when he faced the downs, there was one major thing that he wasn’t able to control …his anger.
Events happen and Daniel wasn’t conscious about his responses, he often let his body take control. As a friend, I was concerned about how he was living his life. I saw how his relationships and even our friendship were affected by his fixed mindset. One day I talked to him about his situation and challenged him to change his fixed mindset, but if I am being completely honest I didn’t believe that was entirely possible. I was aware that at his age his “qualities were carved in stone” and he needed a miracle for that to change. It wasn’t till 2019 when he proved me that Dr. Dweck was correct with her thesis that our mental mindsets can and must be changed and that I was wrong with my assumptions. Surprisingly that year Daniel decided to change to a growth mindset, and now due to his life experience I agree with Dweck thesis that we can change our mindsets and by developing a growth mindset our lives will be enhanced.
First, lets explain the difference between our mental mindsets. In Dweck’s book Mindset: The New Psychology of success, she states that:
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.
Whereas a growth mindset “is based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts […] everyone can change and grow through application and experience.”
With this in mind, we can now talk about how Daniel had a fixed mindset. As I mention before Daniel’s life was perfect in my perspective. But, there was a specific situation that challenged him and turned his life around. After 20 years of working in the Law Enforcement department, Daniel decided that it was time for him to apply for his promotion. With his experience and knowledge he knew he was capable of move to the next level. He prepared for several months for this event, it consisted on a test and an interview with his superiors. He was confident, and impressed everyone in the audience, he did great! His family and friends, we were all waiting to hear about his promotion, but life is not always about what we want, right? Sadly Daniel didn’t get his promotion. The reason? Unknown, his superiors told him to apply for the following term, it was all about luck.
Daniel didn’t think it was about luck, he started wondering if someone in the audience didn’t like him, or didn’t like his work, he was trying to find someone to blame. Can you imagine what emotions was he having at that point? Sadness, anxiety, rejection, disappointment and anger, all negative emotions. It was a painful and terrible experience for him. He had to face failure and he was not in control anymore, his anger became more of a problem. To take a case in point, Daniel’s family was the most affected by this, he used to get home and get upset about simple things, like dinner not being ready or his daughter backpack in the hallway when it was supposed to be in the room. In the words of Dweck, “Our minds are constantly monitoring and interpreting. That’s just how we stay on track. But sometimes the interpretation process goes awry. Some people put more extreme interpretations on things that happen-and then react with exaggerated feelings of anxiety, depression or anger. Or superiority.” And Daniel was reacting with these exaggerated feelings to anything.
Things like this were making Daniel’s life unpleasant. As Dweck explains, “Even in the growth mindset, failure can be painful experience. But it doesn’t define you. It’s a problem to be faced, dealt with, and learned from.” And Daniel was not taking that approach, he was letting this event define him and his life instead of learning from it.
As I mentioned before, I was concerned about my friend and I challenged him to change. To let her anger go away and take things as a lesson to grow and develop new skills. He excused himself explaining that that was his personality since he was young and it never caused him major problems. According to Dweck, “Many people with the fixed mindset think the world needs to change, not them[…] the world should recognize their special qualities and treat them accordingly.” He didn’t think he needed to change something. To invest his time and effort on learning about strategies to control his anger seemed unnecessary to him.
Surprisingly, I agreed with Daniel and told him that I totally understood he was too old to change and learn something new, that he wasn’t capable of growing into a different mindset. And, that was it! I knew Daniel was very competitive, he always needed to be right and the age topic was a trigger for him. I used what is called the reverse psychology to persuade him. He wanted to prove me wrong and he did. Daniel started reading about emotional intelligence, self-control, self-awareness, stress management, exercising constantly to navigate things that he couldn’t control. Dweck explains clearly what Daniel’s situation was at this point, “In the end, many people with the fixed mindset understand that their cloak of specialness was really a suit of armor they built to feel safe, strong, and worthy. While it may have protected them early on, later it constricted their growth, sent them into self-defeating battles, and cut them off from satisfying, mutual relationships.” Along with Dweck states, “People can also have different mindsets in different areas.” And I came to realization that Daniel had the two mindsets, he knew that his intellectual skills were developed, but his emotional skills were fixed.
In the last chapter where Dweck talks about how gratifying is for her to watch people change into a growth mindset she states, “When people hold on to a fixed mindset, it’s often for a reason. At some point in their lives it served a good purpose for them. It told them who they were or who they wanted to be (a smart, talented child) and it told them how to be that (perform well). In this way, it provided a formula for self-esteem and a path to love and respect from others.” Here, I see how Daniel’s fixed mindset served him for a long time, his job demanded from him to be in control of multiple situations, and he needed to prove his superiority to others. However, Daniel was able to understand that changing his mindset was not going to change who he was, and how people see him. In the words of Dweck, “Even when you change, the old beliefs aren’t just removed like a worn-out hip or knee and re-placed with better ones. Instead, the new beliefs take their place alongside the old ones, and as they become stronger, they give you a different way to think, feel, and act.” There were days when Daniel got discourage, “As you can imagine, it’s not easy to just let go of something that has felt like your ‘self’ for many years and that has given you your route to self-esteem. And it’s especially not easy to replace it with a mindset that tells you to embrace all the things that I have felt threatening: challenge, struggle, criticism, setbacks.” Daniel’s motto was a quote by Victor E. Frankl that stick to his mind, “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves” In his own words, he told me “How can I stop now? I know I can’t change the past but I know I can do something to change my current situation?”.
I knew back then that Daniel had developed his growth mindset, because as Dweck explains, “Mindset change is not about picking up a few pointers here and there. It’s about seeing things in a new way.” And he did, his actions proved that he was not ready to stop and give up.
Now, whenever Daniel faces an event that is not under his control, he has the knowledge to address it in the best way possible. He practices yoga every week, he goes for walks to calm down, he lets others speak first and he is able to listen to their opinions. Daniel is not the same person I met in 2016. I’m not going to tell you that he is perfect now, because is not true. Sometimes he still gets upset, but not angry. He is now conscious and has developed the skills that are necessary to take control over his responses. His qualities might have been carved in stone before, but Daniel was so determined to change his mindset that he found a way to cross out those qualities and write better and new qualities that could make him stronger. He proved me that I was wrong, and made me realized that Dweck thesis was right, our mental mindsets can and must be changed, but “It is for [us] to decide whether change is right for [us] now.” It is how we take challenges in life.
