Mindset Makes All The Difference
Establishing a Mindset for Success

I ran track in college and I was a middle distance runner. Every year my coach encouraged me to train with the distance group. She wanted me to run more miles and to race the 5k and 10k on the track. However, I never did. Actually, I refused to even attempt it. I believed I was a built to be a middle distance runner and there was no way that I would be good at the distance races. I didn’t think I could train with the distance girls. I feared racing the 10k because I might not do well. I was comfortable as a middle distance runner, so that’s where I stayed my entire college career. I would consider my college running career average at best.

Post college I figured I had nothing to prove, so I decided to run a marathon just for fun. My first was the Denver marathon and I ended up placing 3rd with a time of 3:03. Since then, I have done seven marathons and I now consider myself a distance runner. It’s funny how things change and more than anything, it has been my mindset about running that has changed the most. I have learned that distance running is more about effort and dedication than it is natural talent.

Carol Deweck, a psychologist at Stanford, has done fascinating research on how our mindset effects how we approach a new situations or challenges and also how we react when we hit adversities or setbacks. Her research over the last 20 years has found that there are two different mindsets that people can have about their ability, which greatly affect their success.

Fixed Mindset: Believes that ability is static an cannot really change that much, which leads to a desire to look good and therefore a tendency to…

• Avoid challenges
• Give up easily
• View effort as futile
• Ignore useful feedback or criticism
• Feel threatened by the success of others

This can lead people to plateau early and achieve less than their full potential.

Growth Mindset: Believes that ability can be developed, which leads to a desire to learn and grow and therefore a tendency to…

• Seek out and embrace challenges
• Persist in the face of setbacks
• See effort as the key to success
• Learn from feedback criticism
• Learn and find motivation from the success of others

All of this results in higher levels of achievement and greater enjoyment.

After learning about this research I realized that there are areas of my life that I tend to have a fixed mindset, my college track career being one example. There are times when I still catch myself falling into a fixed mindset such as, “I can’t run with that group or that person because they are so much better than me” “I don’t think I am going to do that race because I’m not going to do well” or if I have a bad race I think “I’m never going to be any good.”

Are there any areas in your life where you may have a fixed mindset that could be preventing you from tackling new challenges or pushing yourself a little harder? The good news is research shows that the growth mindset can be developed.  Simply recognizing the areas of your life in which you have a fixed mindset is the first step!

Develop your growth mindset: Is there something that you’ve always wanted to do or achieve, but you were afraid that you weren’t good enough? Make a plan to do it! This will also set you up for effective goal setting (read my article on 4 Effective Strategies for Reaching Difficult Goals).

Ashley Corn is Mile High Multisport’s Sport Psychology Consultant. She has her Master’s degree from the University of Denver Sport & Performance Psychology Program and she is a certified consultant with the Association for Applied Sport Psychology.  She is also an instructor for the University of Pennsylvania’s Master Resilience Trainer Course, which teaches performance and resilience skills to U.S. Army Soldiers.  For more information Ashley can be contacted at Ashley@milehighmultisport.comor you can visit her website at www.gutscoachingservices.com.