As a business owner, you need to get used to the idea of living in a state of constant evolution. You need to get used to the idea of eliminating a fixed mindset. There are aspects of life where a fixed mindset can be beneficial, but running your business is not one of them. You need to get comfortable with the idea of having a growth mindset.
Running your business requires you to adapt and to change, all the time. It requires you to force yourself to evolve as an individual and as a business, all the time. It also requires you to study and understand your audience. Your audience, your potential customers, they too are in a constant state of evolution. So you have to roll with it. It is your responsibility to accept that as part of your life now.
You start with the intention of growing, a growth mindset enables you to do that
Initially, you decided to start a business because you have a particular skill set, you have a product that you’re going to bring to market. Fantastic. But what nobody told you is that means that you’ve got to spend the rest of your life studying adapting, changing, and evolving. It is all too easy to develop the fixed mindset to think about things in terms of being final, but nothing is final in this world. Nothing at all.
The truth vs your personal truth
There is no such thing as ‘the truth’. There is only, ‘your truth,’ right now. So what’s true for you right now isn’t true for someone else. And, what’s true for you right today isn’t true for you tomorrow. It isn’t true for you next week. It’s just right now.
Your personal truth, your current perception, is only a representation of how you see things at this very moment. It does not account for the constant introduction of new data, It does not account for the way that that data is interpreted and the changes that come with that. It does not account for things like the constantly evolving and changing social constraints, it does not account for things like the constantly evolving and changing political events that go on around you. Most of all, it does not account for life.
Everything changes but you, when you have a fixed mindset
Nothing in life is fixed, nothing in life is stationary. Everything is constantly evolving, constantly changing, and constantly growing. Some things grow and others retract. Some things change, and some things do not. But there is no one fixed set of conditions. No one fixed set of variables that you have to understand and study. There is no fixed anything.
Your mindset needs to be one of growth. I appreciate that is, to a point, marketing talk and probably doesn’t make that much sense, but bear with me. A growth mindset is not some hippie bullshit. It is not some nonsensical marketing ploy, it is human. The most human, In fact. It is how your brain interprets information from the world around it, how your brain perceives the world around you that is constantly changing. So your perception of it is constantly changing.
A fixed mindset violates the very laws that govern the universe
To have a fixed mindset to think about something as set in stone. It violates the very core principles of life. There is nothing fixed in this world. A growth mindset is not some marketing nonsense. It is being a human being and it is actually less effort to have a growth mindset than it is to be fixed. When you have a fixed mindset about anything you constantly have to defend that position against an ever-changing set of variables. You constantly have to fight to justify your position. And that’s not okay. That is a lot of energy expended for nothing, for no good reason whatsoever. Nothing good comes from it, no development happens, no growth happens, no change happens, no nothing.
Your customers, When they see that you are fixed, that your mindset is set in stone with no possibility of flexibility, it doesn’t offer them reassurance and they don’t view that as an anchor. It doesn’t become something to help them and guide them, they view it as a weakness. A weakness and a misunderstanding of the world around you.
If a fixed mindset is a disease then a growth mindset is a cure
To be stuck in one fixed mindset to be stuck with one fixed perception is a disease, it is something that will kill your business, it is something that will ruin your reputation. How things are is not how things will be, how things have been is not the same as how things are.
Nothing in this world is fixed, nothing is stationary. We live in a constantly evolving and expanding universe. Life by its very definition involves change. Every moment, every day, everything changes. Nothing stays the same. So stop lying to yourself and acting as it does.
Examples of the benefits of a growth mindset are all around you
If you look into the entertainment industry and you look at people that are of a fixed mindset. Let’s break it down even further to the music industry. In music, you have people that are quite vocal about their backgrounds. Which is wonderful, in a way. They will talk about how they won’t change, they’ll never change. Money doesn’t change them, this doesn’t change them, and that doesn’t change them.
Those people either turn out to be liars, just trying to appease their fans. Or, they end up fading away and no longer being relevant. Because the world around them changed and they refused to change with it. But if you look at the musicians that change over time, roll with the punches as it were, that try new things, accept new things, and move away from the old to embrace the new. They continue to stay relevant, they continue to be successful, they continue to grow as a brand, as a musician, and as a person.
There is nothing more natural than a growth mindset
That growth mindset is an essential function of being a human being. It is an essential function of being alive, it is an essential function of existing within the universe. To limit yourself to one fixed perspective is nothing short of insane. So as a business, you need to constantly assess your position in the world, you need to constantly assess the world around you and how your offer stacks up against it. You need to constantly assess the mindset of your customers and your audience, you need to constantly assess everything. And you need to adapt and change because it’s no use just assessing if you’re not going to implement. You need to implement too.
A growth mindset isn’t just a thinking thing, it’s a doing thing as well. You need to actually enact those changes yourself for it to matter. For it to be a worthwhile exercise, for you to keep yourself and your business going. Going AND growing. The two things are interchangeable because they are connected. You can’t really have one without the other. As a business. If you’re not growing, You’re dying. It’s that simple.
Being more self-aware makes it easier to shake off the conditioning of a fixed mindset
It is all well and good for me to talk about the benefits of a growth mindset and the dangers of a fixed mindset but until you have achieved some measure of self-awareness you will be forever stuck with your current perspective.
Self-awareness is not some difficult to achieve zen state that requires you to pack your bags and go and live with Buddhist monks for a year or two. It is much simpler than that. It is a state of deep thought fuelled by reflection. To look inwards at your own self and assess every aspect of who you are.
That in itself just requires a few minutes each day of thinking about yourself, the impact you have, the situations you experience and how you react to them. This is something that I have already written about, which you can check out here https://mybizacademy.co.uk/be-more-self-aware-its-not-hard
The benefits of a growth mindset are studied intently
You might think to yourself that all this talk of a growth mindset is just mambo-jumbo dreamed up by marketers and coaches. That is not true. It is something that has been studied in depth by psychologists and is a tool that the field of psychology deploys to aid in the improvement of a great many conditions.
If you have ever had any form of therapy then you will already know this. There are so many positive applications for a growth mindset, it is phenomenal how powerful it really is.
Figuring it out on your own isn’t always easy
As someone who helps people with this on a regular basis, I feel I am reasonably qualified to help you. If you feel like you would benefit from having a 1:1 chat with me about it then by all means drop me a message on my company website and we can get you booked in for a session https://mikethebizguy.co.uk/Contact