I have never heard of the growth mindset as an actual scientific term before, however I have seen it be put into practice. I personally am a very type A person, I want to do everything right the first time, and if I know I won't be able to do it correctly, I am more than likely not going to do it at all. I have never been big on taking risks because the fear of failing usually outweighs the satisfaction of achieving for me. Doing poorly gives me anxiety and plummets my drive to continue to learn. This mindset is reflected clearly in my poor GPA my freshman year of college.
However, things have started to turn around for me since then. I am now starting my junior year of college, and I feel like a whole new person. My dad has always been my biggest role model and positive influence in my life. He works as a manager overseeing some very large programs in his field, and he has taught me almost verbatim the growth mindset. I am not sure if he actually knows what it is, but I wouldn't be surprised if he did. Every time I called him crying because I failed this test or that assignment, he only asked me one question: "Did you take that test/do that assignment to the best of your ability?" When I said yes, he would tell me there is nothing to cry about because I tried my hardest and that in itself was just as big of a success to him. He always told me if I wanted to just get all As, to go pick an easy major. However, if I wanted challenge and growth, I would have to be willing to accept failure but not defeat. He told me it is okay to fail, but not to give up. "As long as you are learning, growing, and trying, you will succeed." He would say.
Eventually I did learn. I didn't give up. I told myself I am enjoying the challenge and if it comes easy for me all the time I am not pushing myself hard enough. I learned how to keep a positive mindset even when I failed. I turned failure into a motivation instead of an impassable road block. Math does NOT come easily to me, and I still don't like it. But the satisfaction of FINALLY getting a problem right and understanding WHY is so much greater than the satisfaction I got from getting 100s in classes I had to put zero effort into. This semester I have even loftier ambitions, instead of passing my math classes by the skin of my teeth, I want to truly understand it and succeed. For some people that might not sound like much, but for me that is a big deal.
For the subjects that do not come naturally to me, I think the growth mindset is absolutely imperative. Without learning to see each "failure" as simply "not yet", I honestly don't think I would have made it as far as I have. I think this is a much healthier perspective for me to have and in the past year or so that I have mostly adopted it I have already noticed a large difference in my mental health and also my self confidence.
For this semester I want to take it even farther and actively pursue things that I know are challenging to me and that I know I won't excel at right away. I am already doing that by teaching myself computer programming. It is difficult and confusing and I have never gotten a script perfect yet, but when it finally works and my program runs, the rush of pride and satisfaction I feel knowing that I finally moved past my "not yet" and reached "yet" is incredible.
I really wish that more people knew about and implemented this mindset, and I know I am incredibly fortunate to have parents who understand the importance of "not yet" instead of failure. I know a lot of children are not so lucky, and I know how damaging it can be. Even with incredibly supportive parents it was still extremely hard for me to adopt this mindset myself. I can't imagine how it is for children who's families only count success as straight As and nothing less. I wish more teachers also used this mindset in the classroom, especially for very young children who are still impressionable and are just learning how to learn and what success means. Redefining success and failure would do a great deal of good for our future generations, in my humble opinion.
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