Mindset Explained

You may have seen many reels, videos and/or articles in which it is advised to develop a Growth mindset, but do you wonder what is this Growth Mindset and why should you care about it?

A book titled “Mindset by Carol S Dweck” was published in the year 2006 and it became a huge success. In this book the concept of Fixed and Growth Mindset was explained by the author. The whole point of the book is to show that people who believe that they can learn and grow by effort and using proper strategies end up actually performing better than people who believe that some people are born with the capacity to do something while some people cannot change or grow no matter how much they try.

The book is filled with many examples in different fields like sports, business, relationships etc., about how some people thrived in their respective because of growth mindset while those with fixed mindset tend to not do so well or that they fall off.

In short if you believe that your good in certain things and bad in others and that you cannot change it through effort and learning then you fall in the fixed mindset.

If you believe that even though you may not be good at something yet, you can become good in it by effort and learning then you have a growth mindset.

Another important point is that many people have growth mindset in certain aspects of their life and fixed mindset in others. For e.g., a person may believe that by studying they can improve in a subject in which they are currently not performing well, and that same person may believe that being around people and being comfortable in social situations is not something that they can do.

So, what if you have a fixed mindset?

The author contends that you can change your mindset from fixed to a growth mindset. The author has recommended certain steps to develop it

1 Embrace your fixed mindset. - Do not deny it, accept that it exists.

2 Observe and become aware of the triggers that cause to enter into a fixed mindset - it could be pressure to appear good, perform good etc.

3 Give a name to your fixed mindset persona - you can name it after anyone real or fictional.

4 Take this persona of Fixed Mindset on a journey with you - Listen to what this personification of your Fixed Mindset says and then tell it to still give whatever you want to do a shot and even if you fail, tell it that you learned something valuable by the effort.

Another important thing to keep in mind is that a person with Growth mindset is not always in it, they also need to continue developing it otherwise they might also fall under the fixed mindset. The point is to become aware of both these mindsets and try to focus more on effort rather than results.