There is this dude named Scott. After doing a lot of research on happiness, Scott found that people are the least happy from the age of 25 to 45.
Why? Because that's the adult period of your life where you're going to have more responsibilities and more setbacks compared to yourself before the age of 25. And, you're also going to have less money compared to your future self after the age of 45.
Basically, things are going to suck a lot in this period, and having a good mindset will help a lot.
Chemistry Class & Mindset
In the book Mindset, Carl Dweck tells the story of how college freshmen who wanted to become pre-med students had to take a particular chemistry class.
The colleges make this chemistry class very hard on purpose to weed out people who don't have what it takes.
Before taking the class, researchers measured the student's mindset (I assume they did a questionnaire). And there are two types of mindsets according to Carl Dweck: fixed mindset and growth mindset.
People with a fixed mindset believe that their qualities and abilities are fixed, and they can't change them. This means that if they are bad at math or talking to girls, they think that they are just going to be bad at it forever.
People with a growth mindset believe they can improve their abilities. If someone with a growth mindset sucks at math, they believe they can work hard at it and get better. They might not become a math Ph.D., but they believe they can get a lot better than where they are today through effort.
Okay, back to the chemistry class example.
Most people taking the class were pretty interested in chemistry in the beginning.
But as the semester goes on, students with a fixed mindset will start to lose interest. Every time they get a bad grade, they think they are not smart. They become less interested, try less hard, and many don't end up passing the class.
People with a growth mindset were struggling in the chemistry class too. But unlike the fixed mindset people, they don't take it personally when they get a bad grade. They just see it as something they can get better at. They work harder and try different ways to learn. And in the end, they are more likely to pass the class and become pre-med students.
Chemistry Class & Life
Everyone has to deal with setbacks. What kind of mindset you have will determine what actions you take. And the actions you take will determine the trajectory of your life.
There's this saying, “It's not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.”
And I think the chemistry class story is a great example of why we should perceive and react to setbacks with a growth mindset.
That’s it for this week. Thanks for reading!
-George 🐙