HAVE A GROWTH MINDSET
April 11, 2015 — CHRISTINE SIMKO
“Every individual represents a unity of personality and the individual then fashions that unity. The individual is thus both the picture and the artist. Therefore if one can change one’s concept of self, they can change the picture being painted.”
— Alfred Adler, physician, psychotherapist, and Founder of Adlerian Psychology
I was always the type of child to do things on my own terms. Even if that meant getting out there and exploring alone. I chose freedom- at any cost I was determined to make my own way. Somehow, through embracing that type of wildly-independent nature, coupled with my parents being in their own foggy world throughout my childhood (and what inadvertently morphed into consequential events following their choices), I became a bonafide rebel.
Alfred Adler, an Austrian psychiatrist and philosopher, once said that ‘we develop our desires and drives during our childhood then our whole adulthood becomes affected by these childhood experiences’. In consequence, humans strive during their adulthood to fulfill the desires they have developed during their childhood. Well, the aftermath of my childhood became my coping mechanism. I had one mode of living, and that was by the mantra, “my way or the highway”.
I didn’t see many short-term consequences besides ruffling feathers — and I was not afraid of people. I became prideful from independence and through that, my heart hardened. After all, I had proved that I didn’t need anyone! I was so stubborn that I was blissfully unaware of what stubborn really meant for me… and would not allow help or ask. It literally broke my heart to feel like I needed help from another person, it made me feel weak and a charity case to even think about it.
You could imagine how long that lasted while living in New York City, a city with a few million equally stubborn, determined, and willful people. Don’t get me wrong, it didn’t make me into a terrible person or a failure by any means (as being brashly independent seems to be a great tool for survival in a big, tough city by yourself), but my overall way of thinking and attitude was not great for a couple of major urban survival reasons: My ability to learn things I didn’t understand or persevere passed problems I was frustrated with was lessened- despite my intelligence- because of my pride. My true weakness was my inability to pick myself up again after falling, brush it off, then let it go. If I had been able to float past the tougher times with the same willful intent I had inherent for managing conflict- a shrug of the shoulder and my ‘c’est la vie’ sort of humor in tact, I would have also bolstered myself with the higher-vibrational energy to more readily let things go. Developing discipline and persevering passed difficulty, in order to fully bloom and cultivate my budding talents, were imperative for long-term sustainable success, but my inability to take in difficulty as “part of the process” was the thing getting in the way, despite my intent and skills.
Beyond all of the details, it took years just to force myself to learn how to truly listen to others and trust other opinions. Sounds stupid right? That it would be so hard for someone to listen? But flash forward a few years looking back- I am an example of how the effects of childhood can constrain the quality of adult life. But I am not bogged down by those constraints any longer because I have also allowed myself to blossom into an example of how to go from where you started, to whomever you want, which holds no bounds. As a person who absolutely hungers for knowledge, has a vivacious appetite for living passionately, and for helping others find their own path and potential, I have transformed through becoming a growth-minded individual. It does not matter where you come from or what you’ve been through- you can be what you choose. In my previous post, I went over how we live 40% or more of our lives on autopilot. We are creatures of habit… You can change those habits immediately simply by wanting to and doing so. You can have happiness right now by through purely taking in that fresh growth mindset.
P.S., On your own journey to becoming a better communicator (including listening compassionately), while better learning how to strategically working through conflict, I HIGHLY recommend reading or listening to the CD version of “Nonviolent Communication”, or NVC. Here is a video with the author Marshall Rosenberg.
See the diagram below for the outcomes of Fixed vs. Growth Mindset:
Alfred Adler coined a term known as “Fictional Finalism”. He said that people live by many fictional ideals that have no relation to reality, therefore cannot be tested and confirmed as facts. Fictional Finalism proposes that people act as much from accepted ideals as they do from observed reality. Whatever your mind accepts as truth, it acts as if it is true whether it is or not. Your unconscious mind does not have the benefit of the conscious mind’s ability to observe independently and check with real experience.
Even more so, from the point of view of the person in society, any accepted false ideal or fiction can be taken as the basis for their orientation in the world, and as one aspect of compensation for any feelings of inferiority.
When it comes to feeling good about oneself and having a sense of purpose, some people have chosen to pick the road of proving themselves. Whether it’s proving themselves at school, or at work in their careers and with appeasing their boss, or even with their loved ones and trying to make up for lost time, shame or guilt. This mentality of feeling the need to always prove yourself comes with an unconscious mindset we develop over time that shuts down the learning process and prevents healthy, natural brain growth. When every situation calls for a confirmation of intelligence, character or personality every single situation is evaluated from the mindset of — Will I succeed or will I fail if I do this? Will I look smart or dumb? Will I be accepted or rejected by my friends and loved ones? Will I be labeled as a winner or a loser by my coworkers? It becomes an all-consuming goal and everything else falls by the wayside including learning- the absorption and processing of healthy, valid factual information that leads to being content and fulfilled.
When it comes down to it, it’s simple- Why waste all of your energy hiding these deficiencies and weaknesses instead of embracing that we are all imperfect and overcoming weakness to actually be that better person you claim? Why look for friends or partners who will just put you on a pedestal of bs making you feel inadvertently even worse about your settling for a comfortable alright life and falsely build your self-esteem instead of filling your life with people who will also challenge you to grow along with loving you and showing it properly by being there for you in your never ending process of growth? Isn’t that what you would want to do for someone you love? Help them be there best? Why do we as humans seek out the true-blue instead of new satisfying experiences that will push us to be better, even though it’s uncomfortable to break out of that zombie-like state of living initially? Just as you made those unfulfilling behaviors and feelings habits, you too can make being happy and pushing yourself a habit in no time!
“The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’ss not going well, is the hallmark of the growth mindset. This is the mindset that allows people to thrive during some of the most challenging times in their lives.” — Carol Dweck, Stanford University Psychologist and “Growth Mindset” Researcher
As Carol Dweck, a world-renowned Stanford University psychologist, who attended both Yale and Columbia simply put: “Why waste time proving over and over again how great you are when you could be getting better?”
Chew on that for a while. Orrrr you can choose to be a lean, mean learning machine. Right Frickin’. Now. ;)
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