#187: Understanding Mindsets

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What to Expect:

• A working definition of “mindset”
• The science of how mindsets impact us
• Mindsets to cultivate for high-performance

If you've spent time learning about high performance, you've heard the term mindset thrown around a lot. We've been told that we're supposed to have a growth mindset, that a fixed mindset is bad, and that a lot of our experience boils down to the mindset we have in any given moment.

But what is a mindset, anyway? And more importantly, how do we develop the mindsets we need to be successful?

Mindset Defined

We have mindsets about everything: stress, growth, performance, relationships... Anything that influences our experience of the world.

A mindset is just a set of beliefs and attitudes that shape our perceptions and, as a result, guide our actions.

The simple formula looks like this:

Mindset --> Perception --> Action

As a result, these mindsets play a huge role in how we make sense of the world and how we think, feel, and ultimately, behave.

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The Impact of Mindsets

If you want to understand the reach of just one mindset, consider the reach of the growth and fixed mindset:

• People with a fixed mindset tend to buy products that align with how they want to be seen. People with a growth mindset look for products that aid in learning (Murphy & Dweck, 2016).
• People with a growth mindset enjoy work more, are more creative, and engage in more organizational citizenship behaviors (Han & Stieha, 2020)
• Growth vs. Fixed mindset influences our response to criticism, the success of others, how much we learn, and how we approach challenges (Dweck, 2006).

In short, our simple view of the relative importance of our natural abilities or our ability to develop through effort and learning dictates a host of behaviors and decisions in domains ranging from shopping to learning.

Mindsets expand well beyond our view of whether or not our abilities can be changed, though. For example, we have mindsets about stress, relationships, and performance that shape our actions. Other scientists, like Dr. Alia Crum, have explored how the way we think about our health and what we consume impacts us down to our physiology.

For example, Dr. Crum has found that whether or not people view the same shake as "sensible" or "indulgent" determines their ghrelin response (the hunger hormone) at 20, 60, and 90-minutes post-shake consumption. Those who viewed the shake as indulgent had a steep response. The way participants processed the shake determined how full they felt - not the actual nutritional value of the shake itself (Crum, Corbin, Brownell, & Salovey, 2011).

In another study, Dr. Crum and Dr. Ellen Langer (2007) figured out that, if you tell people that the physical work they're doing is good for them and meets the recommendations for an active lifestyle, you can change their physiological health.

The intervention is remarkably simple, with huge impacts.

A group of 84 housekeepers was told that their work was good exercise.

As a result, they perceived themselves as doing more physical activity than before this statement (despite no real change in their behavior). Just a month later, the group that was told that their work was good exercise had:

• Lost weight
• Lower blood pressure
• Reduced body fat
• Improved waist-to-hip ratio
• Healthier body max index

All from changing their mindset about their work.

What all this research suggests is that the way we perceive the world has a much greater impact on our behavior and even the operation of our bodies in ways we aren't consciously aware of.

Something with that much power should be trained.

The good news is that mindsets are something we can access and adjust. This isn't about some BS where you try to "program" your unconscious mind, or a passive process where you just develop the right mindset over time, with age. With some deliberate cultivating of new experiences and exposure to the right people and environments (which you can choose), you can make your mindsets work for you.

Training your mindsets

When you're first learning a new skill, it takes practice.

You might spend hours working on your shot, perfecting your pitch, or stepping up to the plate. In each of these scenarios, repeated acts start to form a larger model in your mind of how to best execute. If you're doing it well, you're getting feedback from a coach or outside observer. Eventually, you're no longer thinking about your elbow position while your shoot or your words while you pitch - you're just delivering.

It's at that point that the skill has been encoded, and though it can still be changed, is the way you're most likely to action it. Changing it will take effort, but is doable  

Mindsets are acquired much like a skill. Mindsets are skills, deployed in specific situations to guide our perceptions and actions.

Like a skill, they take practice. If you're trying to see an activity as physical exercise or exertion, for example, you're going to have to practice that. The first time, second time, and probably even the tenth time you engage, your default will be to see the activity how you've always seen it. You'll need to consciously pause, remind yourself of the new framing, and keep moving.

This process can be enhanced and accelerated by getting feedback from others and having them hold you accountable. If you're developing your growth mindset, you might tell your coach or friend that you're working on framing setbacks more effectively and trying to attribute more of your success to your hard work (and meaning it). These colleagues or coaches can point out when your public narrative doesn't match what you're privately aiming toward, which can help you internalize a more adaptive mindset. If they're skilled, they can also give you feedback that encourages the mindset you're trying to develop. We know that athletes, for example, are more likely to develop a growth mindset when their parents and coaches emphasize hard work and effort in their feedback.

Finally, like most great skills, you want to increase your mindset flexibility. If you watch the best shooters in the NBA, for example, they're able to make difficult, off-balance shots in ridiculous circumstances as a function of their ability to flexibly deploy a skill. They don't have to always do it the same way once they've truly mastered it - they have several permutations they can call on under different circumstances.

If you've mastered a mindset, your flexibility is similar. You don't always have to frame nerves as "excitement" - you can use other appraisals like "challenge," "determination," or "care." This flexibility allows for greater accuracy in unique circumstances and helps prevent you from feeling like you're lying to yourself.

With an understanding of how mindsets get trained - through self-talk, feedback, goals, and practice - we can now take a look at the mindsets we might want to develop to push toward high performance.

Mindsets to Aspire To

The mindsets you develop and actively cultivate will shape your reality. They're a function of the messages you take in and who you surround yourself with, as well as your own beliefs. There's truth to being the sum of the 5 people around you. There's also truth to watching your beliefs because they become your habits.

What we also know is we don't have to leave mindsets up to chance. If you take the time to surround yourself with the people who lift you up, your mindset (and what you're subsequently capable of) will reflect that. If you work hard to challenge beliefs that don't serve you, over time you'll carve new neural pathways that allow for more adaptive, efficient, and flexible responding.

In my work with high performers, the 3 mindsets I've found to be most important to work on are mindsets anyone can develop to get an edge.

The first is a combination of growth and a fixed mindset. In an ideal world, you recognize the value of hard work and effort, and you recognize the unique talents that make you special and how they contribute to your success. To develop this mindset, consider listening to feedback that surfaces your strengths (fixed mindset development) and appreciating how hard work, effort and persistence lead to your results (growth mindset). Both natural ability and effort matter.

The second is a stress-is-enhancing mindset. We all have a default view on stress, and yours most likely aligns with the dominant cultural narrative that "stress is bad." We've been told stress is as harmful as sitting or smoking and socialized into believing our main goal should be to reduce stress as much as we can. (I believe this plays a big role in today's youth mental health crisis, too, as any kid feeling stress is likely to think something is "wrong," since that's what they've been taught).

The problem with this default mindset is that it's simply not true. Stress, by itself, is nothing more than the brain and body preparing you to do something effortful. Stress becomes harmful when it's prolonged with no recovery and can be problematic if you think of it as a problem. Otherwise, with proper recovery and framing, it's simply energy that leads to positive adaptation over time.  

We need to train ourselves to see it that way. That means that when we feel stress, learning to appraise it more accurately as a challenge or opportunity, a sign you care, or a sign of excitement. That means trying to identify and sit with how stress feels and making sure that, after a stressor, you give yourself time to recover.

That leads to the third mindset, which is the mindset that wellness or recovery are investments in future performance, not time away from the game. We need recovery to consolidate learning and skills. We need to invest in our well-being so we can sustain success and take on progressively higher, harder challenges.

Basic practices go a long way here. That includes things like mindfulness, journaling, spending time with loved ones, spending time in nature, eating right, and prioritizing sleep. Building a strong foundation of well-being isn't hard, except for the fact that these are all things people tend to perceive as frivolous and easy to cut when things get tough - the very time we need to double down and invest even more.

If you can start to invest in developing each of these mindsets, you'll start to see an improvement in your performance. Building an adaptive, flexible mind takes practice, and you've now got 3 targets to focus on.

In future editions of the newsletter, I'll share some mindset development playbooks you can use to raise your game.

References

Crum, A. J., & Langer, E. J. (2007). Mind-Set Matters: Exercise and the Placebo Effect. Psychological Science, 18(2), 165–171.

Hsieh, Y., & Wang, H. (2022). Workplace Foam Roller Exercise for Hotel Housekeepers: An Exploratory Study. Recreation, Parks, and Tourism in Public Health, 6, 65–76.

Buchanan, S., Vossenas, P., Krause, N., Moriarty, J. Y., Frumin, E., Shimek, J. A., Mirer, F., Orris, P., & Punnett, L. (2010). Occupational injury disparities in the US hotel industry. American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 53(2), 116–125.

Dweck, C. S. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Random House.