A Wealth of Opportunites Will Be Yours, Provided You Adopt This One Critical Quality

Oh to have a wealth of opportunity! Each day to be invited by the universe to peruse all that is new. To be willing to fearlessly experiment with a new plot for success. To find problem-solving to be a form of play and the greatest challenges as puzzles waiting for us to figure them out. 

"I'd have to change my entire being!" Carl,  a former podiatrist my grandmother likes to chat with, told me over tea on her patio. Au Contraire Dear Carl; this quality allows you to celebrate yourself for being exactly who you are, even when things don't go as planned. Carl next confided in a deeper voice just above a whisper, "I'm probably too old."

Nope. This quality is accessible to all humans of every age. Simply be deliberate in adopting it and this utopia of accessible adventure can be yours, provided you adopt one critical quality.

It is the right mindset, a growth rather than a fixed mindset.

 Mindset deeply impacts our lives.

With a growth mindset you have confidence that your abilities can change and grow.  Even if you fail at something (cue the video of me at the bowling alley with my tenth gutter ball listening to a chorus of "This is so fun!" sung by all the strikers and sparers).

Anyway, you know that you can improve your ability by putting in effort . You know you will learn!  (Me? Learn to grasp that enormous orange and white marble that is a bowling ball with just an index finger, a ring finger, and a thumb and whack through the pins for my third strike in a row? I can learn! I don't have a set idea of being good or bad at bowling! I feel free to succeed.

 With your growth mindset you will call out a confident yes to new opportunities. Everywhere you see new adventures. 

Not only do you learn more with a growth mindset you are also far less judgmental with your self. We refrain from judging our abilities because we know, wherever we're at today, we can change, modify, and develop.

You know the CEO who is so over concerned with looking smart that he or she won't bother to listen to ideas that challenge their ideas?   That's because It's  critical for them to feel like they're the smartest person in the room. That is the fixed mindset. Without the willingness to be open to the fact that we still have a lot to learn, we do only the stuff we are amazing at doing. We need the ooohs and aaahhhhs. The thing is, that with a fixed mindset we may look smart in the short term, but we risk failing in the long term.

One of the precious gems  of a growth mindset is the ability to see mistakes as an opportunity to learn, to improve. A fixed mindset seizes only the opportunity to judge one's self.

 With a fixed mindset, our self-worth is derived from a fixed idea of what we're good at or not good at. We think that list of goods and not goods is never going to change. So we just give up without even trying because we don't want to look foolish. With each incident of not performing optimally, the fixed mindset person  becomes more attached to what they believe they're good at. 

Fear of failure is a result of worrying about being judged, believing we don't have the capacity to grow and change, and that fear of failure tricks us into thinking we shouldn't even try. Opportunities for growth fly so swiftly by the poor soul with the fixed mindset that they experience whiplash.

Before you go buy that neck collar, come join my friend Solange and I on the Mindset Secrets conversation on Clubhouse.  Thursdays at 6:30 PST/9:30 EST.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this. DM me on Instagram at @DrJodiPeary.

I totally admire your courage to adopt the growth mindset. It will be like a megaphone from which to share your truth!  

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