I’ve been working my way through Carol Dweck’s seminal book Mindset.
It explains how people, in general, can have one of two mindsets (or a mixture of the two, we are all complex creatures!) – either a fixed mindset, which assumes that intelligence is a fixed attribute and can never change, or a growth mindset, which allows for improvement.
There’s a lot more to each mindset than just these fundamental assumptions, but they lead to everything else. If you think that people are judging you for your talent and ability, and that there is nothing that you can do to change their assessment (for example, by putting in effort and becoming better at what you do), then you are going to be very invested in protecting your image and your ego, always putting up a facade of perfection. I think you will agree that this path leads to a lot of stress and imposter syndrome.
On the other hand, if you believe that practice and persistence are the way to get better and achieve more success, you will be willing to let people see you make mistakes and grow. If you don’t base your self-worth on people thinking you are a natural, you are much more likely to become a star.
Another fascinating concept I learned from this book was the different way that people look at effort. If you think that effort is for losers, and that real superstars don’t have to work hard for their success, you are less likely to have lasting success, and also a lot less satisfaction from what you love to do. You will constantly be looking over your shoulder and worrying about whether you are good enough just as you are, and whether the next new talent is going to dethrone you.
I have to admit that this last paragraph strikes home for me – as a child I was definitely praised as “the smart one”, coasted through high school with minimal effort, and crashed hard once I realised, in university, that I wasn’t that special. It took me decades to recover.
Dr. Dweck and her students experimented with giving kids easy puzzles (from a non-verbal IQ test), praised half of them for their ability and half for their effort, then gave them harder ones. The ones who were praised for ability didn’t want to do the harder puzzles, because they didn’t want to lose the image of themselves as people who could do things easily. The ones who were praised for effort were willing to put more effort into doing the harder puzzles, and enjoyed them more.
Do you know the really sad part of the story? They then gave both groups easy puzzles again, and the group who had been praised for ability now did WORSE than they had done before. Praising them for their ability had made them less capable, and the tests showed them as having a lower IQ.
They also asked both groups to write a letter to kids at a different school about their experience with the tests, and 40% of the praised-for-ability group LIED about their scores.
How did praise turn kids into liars? By making them think they would only be considered worthy if they got good scores, without a lot of effort.
Think about this, next time you are tempted to tell yourself or someone you love how smart they are.
For the next week, I’ll be continuing a series of short videos on the topic of mindset, talking about its importance and how you can change from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset, do new things, fall down, skin your knees, get up, and keep going.
If that sounds like fun to you, come and join me on this journey. You can find these videos on my social media pages and YouTube channel – see the links in the sidebar. I’d love to have your company!
