Mindset Flashcards
Think about your hero.
Do you think of this person as someone with extraordinary abilities who achieved with little effort? Now go find out the truth. Find out the tremendous effort that went into their accomplishment—and admire them more.
Think of times other people outdid you and you just assumed they were smarter or more talented.
Now consider the idea that they just used better strategies, taught themselves more, practiced harder, and worked their way through obstacles. You can do that, too, if you want to.
Are there situations where you get stupid—where you disengage your intelligence?
Next time you’re in one of those situations, get“yourself into a growth mindset—think about learning and improvement, not judgment—and hook it back up.
More than half of our society belongs to a negatively stereotyped group.
First you have all the women, and then you have all the other groups who are not supposed to be good at something or other. Give them the gift of the growth mindset. Create an environment that teaches the growth mindset to the adults and children in your life, especially the ones who are targets of negative stereotypes. Even when the negative label comes along, they’ll remain in charge of their learning.”
Mindsets frame the running account that’s taking place in people’s heads
They guide the whole interpretation process. The fixed mindset creates an internal monologue that is focused on judging: “This means I’m a loser.” “This means I’m a better person than they are.” “This means I’m a bad husband.” “This means my partner is selfish.”
People with a growth mindset are also constantly monitoring what’s going on, but their internal monologue is not about judging themselves and others in this way. Certainly they’re sensitive to positive and negative information, but they’re“attuned to its implications for learning and constructive action: What can I learn from this? How can I improve? How can I help my partner do this better?”
Even worse, since I was taking more risks, I might look back over the day and see all the mistakes and setbacks
And feel miserable.
What’s more, it’s not as though the fixed mindset wants to leave gracefully. If the fixed mindset has been controlling your internal monologue, it can say some pretty strong things to you when it sees those counters at zero: “You’re nothing.”
Every day people plan to do difficult things, but they don’t do them
They think, “I’ll do it tomorrow,” and they swear to themselves that they’ll follow through the next day.
Vowing, even Intense Vowing–
is often useless. The next day comes and the next day goes.
What works is making a vivid, concrete plan: “Tomorrow during my break, I’ll get a cup of tea, close the door to my office, and call the graduate school.” Or, in another case: “On Wednesday morning, right after I get up and brush my teeth, I’ll sit at my desk and start writing my report.”
Think of something you need to do, something you want to learn, or a problem you have to confront. What is it?
Now Make a Concrete Plan to Achieve it.
When will you follow through on your plan? Where will you do it? How will you do it? Think about it in vivid detail.
These concrete plans—plans you can visualize—about when, where, and how you are going to do something lead to really high levels of follow-through, which, of course, ups the chances of success.
So the idea is not only to make a growth-mindset plan, but also to visualize, in a concrete way how you’re going to carry it out
Critical to Make a Concrete, Growth Oriented Plan
And stick to it no matter what. be stubborn in clinging to it.
The worse they felt, the more they did the constructive thing. The less they felt like it, the more they made themselves do it.
The ones with the fixed-mindset thought: “If I have ability, I’ll do well; if I don’t, I won’t.”
As a result, they didn’t use sophisticated strategies to help themselves. They just studied in an earnest but superficial way and hoped for the best.
people in a growth mindset don’t merely make New Year’s resolutions and wait to see if they stick to them.
They understand that to diet, they need to plan. They may need to keep desserts out of the house. Or think in advance about what to order in restaurants. Or schedule a once-a-week splurge. Or consider exercising more.
They think actively about maintenance. What habits must they develop to continue the gains they’ve achieved?”
“Then there are the setbacks. They know that setbacks will happen.
So instead of beating themselves up, they ask: “What can I learn from this? What will I do next time when I’m in this situation?” It’s a learning process—not a battle between the bad you and the good you.”
When people drop the good–bad, strong–weak thinking that grows out of the fixed mindset
they’re better able to learn useful strategies that help with self-control. Every lapse doesn’t spell doom. It’s like anything else in the growth mindset. It’s a reminder that you’re an unfinished human being and a clue to how to do it better next time.”
“It’s amazing—once a problem improves,
people often stop doing what caused it to improve. Once you feel better, you stop taking your medicine.
But change doesn’t work that way. When you’ve lost weight, the issue doesn’t go away.
When Peoplechange to a growth mindset, they change from a judge-and-be-judged framework
to a learn-and-help-learn framework. Their commitment is to growth, and growth takes plenty of time, effort, and mutual support.”
Regardless of how bad you may feel, do it!
And when you succeed, don’t forget to ask yourself:
What do I have to do to maintain and continue the growth?”
that the view you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way you lead your life. It can determine whether you become the person you want to be and whether you accomplish the things you value. How does this happen?
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.”
This growth mindset is based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts. Although people may differ in every which way—in their initial talents and aptitudes, interests, or temperaments—everyone can change and grow through application and experience.
they believe that a person’s true potential is unknown (and unknowable); that it’s impossible to foresee what can be accomplished with years of passion, toil, and training.
Did you know that Darwin and Tolstoy were considered ordinary children?”
You can see how the belief that cherished qualities can be developed creates a passion for learning. Why waste time proving over and over how great you are, when you could be getting better? Why hide deficiencies instead of overcoming them?
why seek out the tried a“nd true, instead of experiences that will stretch you? The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’s 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.”
those with the fixed mindset who accounted for almost all the inaccuracy in estimating their own abilities
The people with the growth mindset were amazingly accurate.
When you think about it, this makes sense. If, like those with the growth mindset, you believe you can develop yourself, then you’re open to accurate information about your current abilities, even if it’s“unflattering. What’s more, if you’re oriented toward learning, as they are, you need accurate information about your current abilities in order to learn effectively.
The other thing exceptional people seem to have is a special talent for converting life’s setbacks into future successes.
there was wide agreement about the number one ingredient in creative achievement. And it was exactly the kind of perseverance and resilience produced by the growth mindset.”
People in a growth mindset don’t just seek challenge, they thrive on it
The bigger the challenge, the more they stretch. ”
Clearly, people with the growth mindset thrive when they’re stretching themselves. When do people with the fixed mindset thrive?
When things are safely within their grasp. If things get too challenging—when they’re not feeling smart or talented—they lose interest.”
