Have you ever failed? The answer is probably yes, especially when it comes to reaching your health and fitness goals. A lot of the times when we “fall off the wagon” we tend to beat ourselves up about it and use the failure as a definitive line to where your limitations lie. “I just can’t lose weight.” “I’m never going to reach my goals because I can’t maintain my habits.” It’s time you get out of the fixed mindset. What do I mean by that? There’s an awesome book by Carol De Weck called Mindset, and in it De Weck explores the difference between a fixed and a growth mindset and how it contributes to success. The fixed mindset person believes that if they fail it is part of their identity. If they fail at one thing maybe it means they’re not smart enough or good enough, and maybe it means that they’ll never be successful. People with the fixed mindset use that failure to determine their future, instead of using it as a learning opportunity. The growth mindset, on the other hand, is entirely the opposite. People who have the growth mindset view failure for what it is: a chance to learn, correct, and move forward. They ask in their moment of failure what they can learn from it to get better next time...and then they do. Failure is always a part of the journey. It’s normal to fall off and fail because that’s what happens when you’re learning new habits. Think of a baby. It’s said that babies fall at least 300 times before they walk successfully. Do those falls stop them? No. It teaches them what not to do. That and the feedback from their parents that they CAN do it and are doing an awesome job learning encourages them to keep going. Can you imagine if the first time you fell as a baby you never got back up? What would your life look like today? So this week, as you experience failure re-frame your thought process. Instead of thinking: I can’t do this, think: what can I do better to make this happen.
