Mindset: understand the facts

Mindset is a state of mind which defines how we see the world. It is about our belief system, the view you adopt for yourself has a deep effect on the way you live your life. You need to understand how our belief system nurtures our thoughts and actions which can take you on different paths.

Your mindset involves every situation of life whether it is intelligence, personality, career, and relationships. Every single decision or choice is based on your mindset.  You know it, the belief system you cultivate your entire life is responsible for where you stand in your life currently.
A person with a growth mindset can surpass a talented person fixed mindset.

Renounced Dr. Carol S. Dweck described in his book about mindset and she categories mindset into two ways :

• A Fixed Mindset- In this people think they have certain abilities, intelligence, and skills, which can’t be developed more.
  
  
• A Growth Mindset-  In this people believe in learning. They can improve intelligence and talent with learning and practice.

Fixed mindset people always live in fear. They think they cannot compete with people who have inborn talent. They are just trying to prove themselves again and again like if you have any intelligence or knowledge or character then you have to prove it. If they are not good at something, they believe they can’t be good at that thing and leave it.

In a Fixed mindset, people try to hide their weaknesses and mistakes and feel ashamed about them. For them being failed at something is giving up. They don’t know how to handle failure and blame others for their doings. They marked temporary failures as permanent and change their goals or targets. They lack motivation, confidence, effort, and hope. They start resisting new opportunities and challenges to prevent or avoid failure. They start protecting their images what if they fail to do new things? They believe talent can’t be acquired through practice and so they even don’t try new things. They don’t accept feedback and ignore self-assessment.

They believe in:

• ·       Believe intelligence and talent are inborn
• ·       Avoid challenges to avoid failure
• ·       Don’t take feedback from others
• ·       Hide mistakes and weakness
• ·       Believe putting in the effort is worthless
• ·       View feedback as destructive criticism 
• ·       Give up easily and blame other

 

Growth mindset people always try to learn. They believe that basic qualities are things that can be developed or improved through efforts. They like challenges, try new paths rather than walk on tried and tested, and look for new opportunities which stretch them to be better.

In a growth mindset, people accept weaknesses and mistakes and treat them as an opportunity to learn and grow. They take failures or setbacks as an important lesson and figure out what they lack so they can improve through learning and find new ways to overcome that deficiency. They think anything can be achieved through consistent efforts, we can develop intelligence over time with practice.

They love challenges, and the risk of failure, and don’t feel threatened about their image or what people think. If they fail at something they believe it is a temporary setback and bounces back with proper learning, efforts, and practice. They love feedback and treat them as constructive criticism.

The study by Moser et al suggested that individuals with a growth mindset are receptive to corrective feedback, exhibiting a higher error positivity waveform response, which is correlated with a heightened awareness of and attention to mistakes.

The attitude of stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when you are not doing well, is the characteristic of the growth mindset. This is the mindset that allows people to thrive during some of the most challenging times in their lives.

They believe in:

• ·       Open to learning
• ·       Believe intelligence can be acquired by practice
• ·       Accept challenges and try to put efforts to solve
• ·       Believe effort leads to mastery
• ·       Believe failures are just temporary setbacks
• ·       View feedback as a source of information
• ·       View feedback as constructive criticism

From failure to success-

Converting failure into success is a great asset of growth mindset people. They know how to from failure or mistakes rather than blaming others. They never labeled themselves as rejected.

Let me redefine the definition of success. Success is all about doing your best in jobs, learning, and improving, not proving yourself as somebody. Efforts and hard work in the right direction are the best friends you have. If you fail at something try to find some motivation and information in it. Every setback or failure has some learning or at least now you know the wrong way to do those things and many times it’s really useful to know what not to do rather what to do. You need to take control of your ability and remind yourself you are a work in progress, not a finished product. There is always room for improvement. 

 Can a person’s mindset change?

As we know humans are so much evolved over time. Our physical and mental capabilities also improved during the last decades. Scientific studies prove that we can change our thinking and behavioral patterns as well. You can rewire your cognitive functions, such as attention, memory, and decision-making. You can set up new connections as rebuilt new neurons.

Both progress and setbacks have deep effects on our emotions. So in the morning, you can feel successful, the better—feelings of excitement help shape behaviors that will set you up for success.

As neuroscientific researcher finds growth mindset has a connection with two important areas of our brain,

The First one is the Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex (DLPFC) is critical to error-monitoring and behavioral adaptation. Learners with a growth mindset are efficient in error monitoring and receptive to corrective feedback.

The Second one is Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC) is the region of the frontal midline cortex that is related to learning and control. ACC is associated with cognitive control and motivation

The use of neuroscientific techniques enables us to focus on the learning process rather than the learning outcomes which are a key characteristic of growth mindset peoples. 

How to develop a growth mindset-

1.    By understanding our thought patterns and changing your belief system by feeding that you can change.

2.    Always open to learning and embracing challenges

3.    Reward the small changes or wins

4.    Get feedback and use them in constructive ways

5.    Being active and ready to change

6.    Understand failure is informative and learn from them rather labeled yourself as a loser.

Remind yourself to switch your thoughts, habits, and mindset is a huge step. It’s a process that may take a long time, adjustment, and learning. In a growth mindset, you need to understand that there are so many things you possibly don’t know yet but you can find out them.

You try to spend more time with yourself and veterans and ask them a lot of questions and share your insecurities and fear so that you find ways to overcome them. You don’t judge or label anyone because you know things can be acquired by consistent efforts and learning and anyone can do it.