Why you need to have the right mindset for success.

“The battle is already won before you step onto the battlefield.”                        Sun Tzu / The Art of War

Sherry got her coaching certification and started to build her practice.  She wanted to teach people who were overworked how to manage their stress with mindfulness techniques.

She worked at building her coaching practice for a few years, but she wasn’t earning enough to support herself without a part-time job.

Sherry wanted to coach people.  She was not excited about writing blogs or giving free talks to inspire people to work with her.  She was challenged by learning technology and found it extremely challenging to keep up with the tech trends.

Sherry had a fixed mindset because didn’t like the challenges of running a business.

Her negative self-talk reinforced how much she hated technology.  The effort it took to get new clients caused her not to think about the progress she was making toward her goals.

Sherry’s inner critic kept telling her why her business wouldn’t work and how much effort she would have to put into tasks she didn’t like.

She felt pain (frustration and anxiety) and failed to focus on the small steps of progress she was making in building her business.

Sherry decided to quit working on her business.  She gave up her dream.

According to Carol Dweck, author of Mindset, there are two types of mindsets.

The world is divided between people who have a fixed mindset and a growth mindset.

Here’s what a fixed mindset looks like:

• You believe your intelligence and talent is not changeable.
  You’re concerned about judgment, which can make you feel self-conscious and anxious.
• You tend to avoid challenges and obstacles and you give up easily.
• You don’t fulfill your full potential. This causes you to feel badly about yourself.

Here’s what a growth mindset looks like:

The hallmark of a growth mindset is that you have a passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it even when the going gets tough.

• You believe that you can improve and change your personality traits over time.
• You work hard to keep learning, take risks and embrace challenges even when you’re feeling stressed.
• You believe talents and abilities can be developed through hard work, good strategies and mentoring.
• You turn your inner critic into your coach.

The good news is that people can have both mindsets – you can have a fixed mindset in one area and a growth mindset in another area.

Your mindset affects everything from your interpersonal relationships to your worldview, which is a framework of ideas and attitudes about the world, ourselves and life, a comprehensive system of beliefs.

Here’s the interesting part, all of us look at people who are successful online and we immediately assume they just “made it” – they’re an overnight sensation.

For example, when someone becomes known online such as Marie Forleo, founder of B School, who earns millions annually from that program, most people don’t know that she has been working on her business for 17 years!

Gary Vaynerchuck has been online since he was 22 years old.  He talks about the work that goes into creating a business.  Here’s his video on Overnight Success. It’s worth watching!

Dweck assigns her Stanford University freshman students to pick a hero and research the time it took that person to become a success.

Her students inevitably find out that their hero put in tremendous time (years) and powered through their challenges.

She tells her students to expect that their journey to success will be filled with obstacles but if you can work with your mindset, you’ll get there.

Developing a growth mindset is a lifelong journey of monitoring your trigger points and taking on challenges, sticking to them and learning from them.

How to move towards a growth mindset:

• Challenge yourself all the time – do not quit!  Every time you work on a hard task and stick to it, the neurons in your brain form new connections and you get smarter! This leads you to take on the challenges and stick to them.
• Take your setbacks and turn them into valuable information.  Think about what didn’t work and try it again.
• Begin to think the way people with a growth mindset think — the future presents an opportunity to grow, even during challenging times.

Keep in mind – you have a unique set of skills that will lead to a unique contribution if you stick to what you’re doing.

Here’s to your success!

If you liked this article, please share it or leave a comment below.  Which mindset do you have in your business?

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