The reflection I am talking about here is more to do with your innate traits…  

How do you view yourself as a person? Are you athletic and smart or slow and a below average student?

From what I observe in the gym space people don’t think much of themselves…

When asked if they can do a certain movement or skill people will sooner talk themselves down and say they can’t do something rather than trying first to find out if they can…

Sure some things like a strength based movement are hard and you will definitely know straight away but some things should be tried before the white flag is raised.

I am a massive advocate of the work of Carol Dweck in this department. Her book called Mindset describes these 2 frames of mind as either the fixed or growth mindsets.

Those adopting the fixed mindset view themselves as someone who is smart, dumb, athletic or non athletic and are fixed traits. Your view is these traits are fixed and for someone to be successful they would either have them or they don’t.

Those with the growth mindset believe they can get smarter, more athletic and the more effort they put in the better they will get. This mindset generally leads to higher achievement.

The caveat here is you can be both. You can be fixed around your athletic development because progress is slow and hard but study is easy and you can learn new things easily so you’re growth orientated around your intelligence…  

Where does this show up in your life? What are you fixed about and where do you feel you adopt a growth mindset?

Shaun Diachkoff

@shaundiachkoff