Hey guys, and welcome back to another episode of your Brains Coach podcast. My name is Angela Shurina, I'm your host, I'm your Brains Coach and also an executive health and high performance coach on a quest to build a million dollar consultancy in the next year. And I'm here to explore, learn, share with you, practice together brain-body tools, tools of self-mastery, of self-improvement, of self-growth and self-excellence, so together we could take better control of our thoughts, of our emotions and, most importantly, of our actions, so we could create future vision, destiny that we desire. Today and for the next podcast, we're going to be talking about growth mindset and practices to build this up. By definition, growth mindset is all about getting better, realizing where you are and knowing that you have capacity to improve. Now you might not be able to improve your height well, at least not at this stage or your genetics again, not at this stage, just yet. But you can improve almost every single aspect of self, from your personality to your character, to the way you speak, to the way you show up, to the way you deliver feedback, to the way you lead, to the way you do business, to the way you I don't know do fitness. You can improve every single aspect of yourself. That is what growth mindset is all about. But I think so many of us forget that the growth mindset itself is a skill set and we often have more of a growth-oriented mentality in practice in some areas like, let's say, maybe your fitness or your business, and we're stuck and have more fixed mindset in other areas. And guess what? Growth mindset, just like any other skill, it's not something you have by its own definition. It's something that is always a work in progress, something that can be iterated, tested, falsified and improved and built upon.
Speaker 1Growth mindset this is, I feel, like we as society fell in love with this idea of figuring everything out and being right. But, guys, if you are committed to improvement, to self-evolution, to mastery, to growth, you're going to fall out of love with being right and fall in love with growing and actually almost falling in love with being wrong and failure. Failure, guys, fear of failure and this uncomfortable feeling. I've definitely been failing a lot and now I'm realizing it's actually a very good sign and instead of, like in my past, trying to avoid it, I need to lean into it and ask a different question not how to get it right, but where am I getting this wrong? You will not be able to grow effectively and consistently without this one question and without falling in love with failure. Yes, failure, guys. What is failure? It's not the end, it's a data point.
Speaker 1Let's talk about one of the greatest, most talked about entrepreneurs of our time, at least for now Elon Musk and his SpaceX. Think about that. Every single of successful launches of his rocket was well. It started with many, many failed attempts. I remember watching the lift of the first one of this thruster, or whatever that system is, before launch. Elon Musk and his company, spacex, were able to put it in the orbit and then make it come back. Before all of that, I remember things blowing off and bursting into pieces a few times. They almost didn't survive as a company and because of that, because of these mistakes that cost millions, if not billions of dollars, because of these mistakes, they knew how to fix things and that's why shit works right now.
Speaker 1Can we all realize that that failure is an essential data point, that we need to build things that work and hopefully we'll learn how to fail with less waste and less resources spent on that failure? That's why you kind of want to iterate and fail in many micro ways and small ways, not necessarily in the biggest way, so you can win big. You didn't. And also, we need to repeat ourselves. I would even put it on the wall somewhere you didn't fail, your actions did. You're not a failure. Your strategy fell short. We need to disconnect the act of failing or getting it wrong with personality. Don't take it so damn. Personally, I want to repeat to myself every single time you did not fail, your actions did. Like what you did just now. The actions were wrong, your strategy fell short. But you're this amazing human being who can lean into this data and learn from it and switch things around, adjust things and get better and improve and succeed. You didn't fail, your actions did. You are not a failure. Your strategy fell short. Repeat to yourself again and again and again, guys, and that's good news, because failed actions and strategies they can be used to do better. That's how you know how to do better. That's a very, very useful data point. Guys, in fact, if we think about failure, our brain learns a lot better and naturally, through failure, in fact, when you fail, your brain releases cortisol and adrenaline and a bunch of those stress hormones that don't feel good, but they also make you stop.
Speaker 1And, if you have the right mindset, stop and consider what just happened, why it happened and what I need to change to adjust and do better next time. If you approach every failed attempt with curiosity instead of self-criticism and taking it so impersonally. If you lean into every failed attempt and ask yourself a bunch of questions like what can I learn from this, where did I get this wrong, what went wrong? And how can I adjust it to test it in a better way so I have a better chance of succeeding because of this failed attempt? In science, they call this experimentation. Did you know that every scientist, when they design their experiments, they go into the experiment especially seasoned scientists not with this mindset well, I'm going to get it right. Right, I have a theory and I want to get it right. No, they want to gather as much data as fast as possible. So they do create a better theory, and every task has two legitimate outcomes it either confirms your theory or it disconfirms your theory, at which point you need to adjust your theory and create a better experiment, and then reiterate, reiterate, reiterate until you create a theory that then you can use in life, whatever area the application is, so you can create working models in the world to create different results. That's how scientific method works and actually that's how life works. Your brain itself works on prediction and it creates the symphony of brain-body chemistry to act on that prediction. And guess what? When your prediction goes wrong, when you fail, your brain releases a bunch of those stress hormones and chemicals. So you pay attention and you adjust your knowledge, your theory, so next time your brain can predict better and can do better in real world.
Speaker 1Learn faster by asking the right people and the right questions. That's the most important insight that I recently got. When I schedule conversations with seasoned consultants, seasoned business owners and leaders, I go into the conversation not to see where I'm right, but I ask this question specifically where am I getting this wrong? Where am I wrong with this model, with this offer, with this theory that I propose, with this service? Where am I getting this wrong? What I'm not understanding? How would you do differently? I'm trying to poke as many holes in my own thinking, in my own theories, as possible so I could learn faster and get it right faster.
Speaker 1I believe this is one of the most important questions we all need to learn when am I getting this wrong? And get as much as possible feedback from the right people, people who did it, people who are above you, advanced in their game, and ask this question where am I getting this wrong? Not to get a perfect answer, because there isn't one. Each situation is indeed different and unique, but people who've done a similar thing that you're trying to do have a much better framework and theory that already worked for them in their situation, and that's why it's important to find people as close to a situation as possible, or in the same industry, or in the same field of business, or in the same industry or in the same field of business, or in the same fitness and health shape. So find that person, find who did it, find who went through this transformation, and ask them where am I getting this wrong? Give them as much backstory as possible and then ask where am I getting this wrong? And write down, take notes, like all this input and then put it to the test Again. The answer is not going to be perfect, fit, but it's going to be a much better answer or at least a different answer, the one that was not in your head initially.
Speaker 1And this new data will help you design better experiments, more experiments, and then help you to learn faster and adjust faster and get to success faster. So the main takeaway here is failure isn't a reflection of your worth. It's a feedback loop. It's a data point. Embrace it, learn from it and, most importantly, use it to design better not perfect actions. And don't forget to get better at growing and practicing your growth mindset. Ask this question more often when am I getting this wrong? Get comfortable with the idea that you are getting a lot of things wrong.
Speaker 1And here is a bonus insight that I got from system thinking, reading books on system thinking Every system and you are a system every system is optimized to get the result that it's getting. So you are, at this point in your life, are optimized to get the results that you have in your life right now. Nothing more, nothing less. You are a perfect machine to get the results you have, and so if you want to have different results and different life or business, you're going to change yourself. You're going to change what you do and, most importantly, you're going to change how you think, because your thinking starts before you take action, and the real difference between people who have more, what you want is your thinking, and that's where it all starts, and that's why this question where am I getting this wrong? And clarifying your thinking and spelling it out to other people. Wrong and clarifying your thinking and spelling it out to other people that's where it gets very, very useful and an essential skill to change your thinking, to change your doing, so you could redesign the system and optimize it for getting new results. That's what I wanted to share with you today.
Speaker 1A very practical question where am I getting this wrong? And this idea that you are wrong. You've already failed and you're going to fail. Ideally, if you are into growth and self-mastery, self-evolution, you're going to be failing every single day. So what are you going to try to fail at today? What is data that you are collecting? And where are you getting this wrong? As smarter people, better people, suited better to answer the question or the quest that you are on, and ask them where am I getting this wrong? What am I not doing right? And tell them your story and see what comes up. And don't expect this to be a perfect answer, a perfect solution, but it's going to be a different one, the one you can put to test, the one you can learn from, you can improve from and you can succeed from Hope this helps.
Speaker 1Stay tuned for our next episode, where I'm going to share with you lift framework to train your thinking process into more of a growth mindset thinking process in the areas where you are stuck, whether that's business, whether that's relationships, whether that's your health and fitness. So stay tuned for that. But today you'll practice it. Start asking this question where am I getting this wrong? Then design your experiment, improve, succeed. Folks, if you find this podcast useful, please do share with at least one other person so we can all improve as society. We can learn, we can grow, we can create better future, better world, faster. Sharing is caring. Help me to spread the word out so we all adapt more of a growth mindset, embrace failure, learn, improve, get better to create a better world. Thank you, have an awesome day of failing and growing and until next time, where am I getting this wrong? Ask it more often.