#59 Entity Mindset vs Incremental Mindset

ByLukas
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Do you believe you’re good at something solely because of talent, invalidating all the work you’re putting in?

Or do you believe you can change the course of your life, and let your daily actions shape who you are?

The American psychologist and author of the book “Mindset” Carol Dweck describes how the way you think about your abilities can make or break your success in life:

  • Entity (fixed) mindset: “I’m good at languages, I’m bad at math”
  • Incremental (growth) mindset: “I worked hard on this, I’m learning, I’m discovering how to do this”

An entity mindset makes you run into a wall

When things get tough, people with an entity mindset often give up, because they don’t truly believe they can get much better.

After all,I if you believe it’s all about innate ability, then why make any effort to develop strengths or weaknesses?

An entity mindset also leads to fear of failure and perfectionism. If you’re believed to have an innate, fixed talent that’s set in stone, you’ll constantly need to live up to an unreasonably high standard for that particular talent.

An incremental mindset makes you thrive

People with an incremental mindset, on the other hand, thrive in tough situations: they know that through perseverance and a focus on daily practice and perseverance they can develop their skills and talents.

Even if predisposition plays an important role, switching to an incremental mindset will always make you feel better about yourself and your daily actions.

And while education and childhood experiences have a large impact on your mindset – you can always change your mind – by changing your actions.

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    #31 Ignore, then highlight more

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    A daily insight from Tony Robbins:

    Wherever focus goes, energy flows.

    Tony Robbins, https://www.tonyrobbins.com/career-business/where-focus-goes-energy-flows/

    We’re always ignoring and highlighting parts of our experience to make sense of the world – and it determines the way we feel.

    To feel bad, you (temporarily) have to ignore all the events and things you consider positive.

    To feel good, you (temporarily) have to ignore events and circumstances that can be challenging.

    It all depends on context.

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    Sometimes you’re better off highlighting a bit more.

    The big challenge: most of the time, we’re not aware of where our focus goes – so we let old habits and patterns decide how we feel – even if they don’t serve us at all.

    Here’s an exercise I found useful: Tomorrow, focus on something that’s important for you once an hour (a post-it on your desk or a reminder on your phone can be useful). That way, it remains top of mind (and your energy will flow toward it).

    Every hour, also take a moment to become aware of what you’re deleting from your experience, and what you’re highlighting.

    • What am I trying to do today?
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    #92 The true purpose of memory

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    Memory isn’t an objective account of the past – and that’s not its purpose either.

    Memory stores the lessons we extract from life experience. And to do so, it modifies, adds, subtracts, highlights, and hides.

    Hot soup burns my tongue – next time, I’ll remember the pain, but not if it was tomato soup or chicken soup. And I’ll remember to wait a couple of minutes before having the first spoon.

    Experience lived. Irrelevant info deleted. Lesson learned. Memory created.

    My country gets invaded – and that causes so much pain, I won’t just deliver an objective account of what happened: I’ll make sure to tell everyone who the evil guys are too.

    Experience lived. Story modified. Lesson learned. Memory created.

    I eat the most delicious dessert at a Mexico City restaurant – that’s the memory I’m going to tell my friends about, not which glass of dessert wine I had with it.

    Experience lived. Dessert highlighted. Lesson learned. Memory created.

    You’re going to make memories anyway. Which lessons do you want to learn?

  • #362 Your perspective is defective

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    Change happens when you let go of defective perspectives about who you were, are, and could be.

    What you used to do, are doing, and could do.

    What’s possible for you, and what’s not.

    Whatever your current perspective, it’s defective. Or at least incomplete.

    Life is beautifully unpredictable. You are beautifully unpredictable.

    I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

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    #270 How to gain trust, acceptance, and comfort

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    It’s hard not to trust someone who fully trusts themselves.

    But it’s hard not to accept someone who fully accepts themselves.

    It’s hard not to be at ease around someone fully at ease with themselves.

    In other words: if you want others to trust, accept, and be at ease with you, first learn to trust, accept, and be at ease with yourself.

    You don’t need anyone else for that – just some tiny daily actions that prove that trust, acceptance, and comfort to yourself.

    Oh, and you could start with that today.

    You don’t have to.

    But you could. And if you could, why wouldn’t you?

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