Setting The Mind

Photo courtesy of http://www.jackedandstrong.com/developing-a-growth-mindset

Michael Gervais said it best in a recent Finding Mastery podcast that he recorded. The 8-minute episode was devoted to diving into the difference between mindset and setting the mind. Carol Dweck’s growth mindset model has been widely embraced by the world of education over the past few years for all the right reasons. However, Michael Gervais flips the mindset model and focuses instead on the power of setting the mind. ​

Setting the mind requires a conscious effort to think, behave, and act differently. It requires investing time and energy into preparing our minds by utilizing specific techniques and strategies to get our mindset where it needs to be to get the job done well (whatever that job may be). We can talk about growth mindset all day long, but if we aren’t willing to train our minds to think in this way, any mention of a growth mindset is just talk. 

Embodying a growth mindset means we must prepare our minds by setting them in the right way. Setting our minds is no easy task, something that many people struggle with (myself included). However, with the necessary investment of time and energy, we can learn how to set our minds in a way that not only allows us to improve upon ourselves both personally and professionally, but to also model this process to our students. It’s great to stress to our students that we can learn from failure, but more importantly to give them the tools and the skills to set their minds before potential failure occurs. 

Are you actively trying to improve upon your own mindset? If so, is it working? You might find that switching things up and trying something different might have more of an impact in this area. 

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