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Many of us may already have a growth mindset in some areas of our lives and yet be stuck in a fixed mindset in others.

For example, I could be very successful in my career and be updating my skill set through continuous professional development and yet believe that I am just unlucky at relationships, or health, or …. Do you get the picture? Just because we have a growth mindset in one area of our lives does not automatically mean that we have the same set of beliefs in others.

John Maxwell in his book The 15 invaluable Laws of Growthreiterates what we have been saying over and over again: that all change and growth begins with awareness and intention. To put it another way, positive change and growth does not happen by accident. If we were to ignore an area of our lives, it is more likely that it would devolve rather...

 People with a growth mindset, on the other...

One of the most profound applications of Dweck’s research on mindset has to do with its application to our closest relationships. 

Dweck and her colleagues found that people’s mindsets greatly impacted how they dealt with their personal relationships. 

Over the next few days let us look at key ways in which our mindset can help or hinder our family relationships. 

Firstly, Dweck’s research implies that people with a fixed mindset tend to believe that there is one special ‘soul mate’ for them, a ready made person who will complete them, make them happy and provide them with everything they have ever longed for. According to Dweck, "In the fixed mindset, the ideal is instant, perfect, and perpetual compatibility. Like it was meant to be. Like riding off into the sunset. Like "they lived happily ever after."

People with a growth mindset on the other hand, are more likely to engage with someone who has a realistic perception of them, who may see...

Do your children enjoy learning? 

During their research on the impact of mindset on children, Dweck and her colleagues found another benefit of having a growth mindset: The researchers found that the kind of mindset the child had not only determined their relationship to failure, but also predicted whether or not they would enjoy learning. 

The findings from Dweck’s mindset studies are especially important for parents and educators. 

In one study of students, Dweck and her colleagues gave students challenging IQ problems. For the results the researchers offered two types of praise: some students were told "Wow, you got [X many] right. That’s a really good score. You must be smart at this," while others were told, "Wow, you got [X many] right. That’s a really good score. You must have worked really hard." In other words, some students were praised for ability and others were praised for effort.

The researchers found that praise which focused on ability or outcome of test pushed students into the fixed mindset, and they showed all the signs of a fixed mindset: when given a choice, they rejected a challenging new task that they could learn from. They didn’t want to do anything that could expose their shortcomings and call into question their talent.

The students who were praised for their effort...

While doing research with children, Dweck and her colleagues found that mindset predicted how a child would respond to feedback and correction.

Children displaying a fixed mindset only paid attention to feedback that reflected directly on their present ability. For example, they paid attention and lit up when they were told how smart they were. 

On the other hand, they tuned out or ignored information that would help them learn and improve. The research showed that children with a fixed-mindset showed no interest in learning the right answer when they had gotten a question wrong on a test or a quiz, presumably because they had already filed it away in the failure category. 

Those children with a growth mindset on the other hand, were eager to learn and correct their mistakes. They paid keen attention to information that could help them expand their existing knowledge and skill, regardless of whether they’d gotten the question right or wrong. The researchers concluded...

We have been discussing mindsets and how they manifest themselves from a very early age.

Dweck and her colleagues did some research with four year olds. The researchers gave the four year olds a choice between easy and challenging puzzles. Those with growth mindsets chose the more challenging puzzles whilst the toddlers with a fixed mindset chose the easier and therefore safer puzzles. 

According to the researchers’ conclusion, choosing the easy puzzles was an affirmation of their existing ability and the belief that smart children don’t make mistakes. The children with the growth mindset on the other hand, did not want to do the same puzzle over and over again, preferring to learn something new, even if was more challenging and they may not get it right on the first try. 

The researchers therefore concluded that the fixed-mindset children wanted to make sure they succeeded so that they would appear intelligent, whereas the growth-mindset ones wanted to challenge...

Since our mindset is "an interpretative process that tells us what is going on around us", it not only helps us make sense of the world and how it works, it also determines how we engage with the world. 

According to Dweck, one of the ways we can determine our mindset is by noticing the internal dialogue that goes on in our minds. 

She explains that in a fixed mindset, there is an internal monologue of constant judging and evaluation, and every piece of information is used as evidence either for or against the assessment of whether you’re a good person, whether you are smart or talented enough, whether your partner is selfish, or whether you are better than the person next to you. 

In a growth mindset, on the other hand, the internal monologue is not one of judgment but one of learning and curiosity. The feedback from the environment (including things that have not gone well) is used as information on learning how you can do better next time. 

So let us...