Do a Mental Detox Before You Seek to Adopt a Success Mindset
If you're going through this training, you are looking to achieve greater success in at least one part of your life.
You can't wait to adopt the right mindset, so you can get better results.
I understand that.
The problem is, you're having a tough time achieving the kind of success you want because you are probably hanging on to a few "toxic" mindsets that undermine you.
You have to clear these out first before you adopt positive mindsets.
Otherwise, these toxic mindsets will degrade, impede, or otherwise negatively affect the new mindset that you're trying to adopt, and you end up nowhere.
Get rid of these toxic mindsets so you can be in a better position to reprogram yourself for better success.
I call these mental roadblocks...
Mental Roadblock #1: Others are to Blame for Your Failure
One of the most common games people play with themselves is to think that the reason why they're facing setbacks is because others have it in for them.
Maybe these other people were sabotaging them, maybe they were just negligent. Whatever the case may be, the reason why you're failing is because of other people. This also applies to situations beyond your control.
This is very comforting for many people. After all, this thinking reduces people into victims. Victims are sympathetic. People have a natural tendency to favor the underdog. Who doesn’t want to be the underdog? Who doesn’t want to have the natural sympathy of the crowd? The problem is that playing the victim comes at a very high price.
You have to get rid of this mental roadblock because the moment you blame other people for your failure, you're giving them the power to fix your situation.
If somebody or a situation is to blame, then it necessarily follows that they have to fix your situation because they caused the problem in the first place. They broke your life, so they must contain the solution to whatever it is you’re suffering from. Do you see how this leaves you powerless?
You can't control those people or situations. Since you can’t control these people and your past, you aren’t going to be handed the solution to your situation. That’s just not going to happen.
Everybody’s got enough problems of their own. They can’t be bothered with yours.
This is why you have to let go of blaming others for your disappointments. Otherwise, you’ll continue to fight battles of the past. You’ll continue to re-enact certain situations in your mind and engaging in all sorts of ‘could have, would have, should have’ games with yourself.
You end up feeling stuck. Sure, you want to move on. You understand that it’s important. But the more you dwell on the past, moving on becomes nearly impossible.
Mental Roadblock #2: Real Change is Impossible
This toxic mindset is not as absolute as you think. People who suffer from this mindset actually phrase it in many different ways depending on the circumstances, but it still all leads to the same disappointing result.
Either you say that something is flat out impossible, or things are not right. You're just waiting for the right set of circumstances, and then maybe you'll take action.
At other times, you say to yourself, "This is not the right time to take the opportunity." Alternatively, you convince yourself that you don't have enough resources right now.
Whatever the case may be, they all lead to the same place: you do not change. You have all the justification you need to continue to do things the exact same way you’ve always done them.
You understand that change can truly improve your life. That’s not the problem. Willingness is not the issue. Instead, you just feel that you can’t change because of so many things going on in your life as well as how the past played out.
You have to get rid of this idea.
Please understand that real change is possible, but it is chosen. It is something that you decide on. It is something that you commit to.
You're not waiting for the right circumstances, the right time, the right resources or the right people to come about. They don't have to. You just have to believe that real change is possible, and things will present themselves because your mind is open to change.
But the more you wait for the proper factors to appear; the less likely change will happen. You just doomed change because you believed, at some level or another, that it's impossible. If you think something is simply not going to happen you, subconsciously won’t put much effort into it.
Mental Roadblock #3: Your Past Mistakes Define You
A lot of people striving for success end up sabotaging themselves because they feel that they really can't achieve any great success in the future because of their past. They think that they have screwed up enough so often and so severely in the past that future victories are really not going to happen.
They're shooting for second or third prize. In fact, in many cases, they're just going through the motions. They've given up on the race before they even started.
An alternate version of this is the ridiculous idea that you have to somehow start with a completely clean slate to make real changes in your life. In other words, you're going to have to be perfect.
Because you've already made mistakes, you've already screwed up, either way, both versions lead you to the same place: you don't even bother making a change.
You discourage yourself from even trying. In your mind, it’s a foregone conclusion before you even start.
Well, the good news is that the past does not define you. You may have failed an infinite number of times before, but that does not prevent you from getting it right this time.
The only way you will fail is when you read your long record of failures as something so discouraging and so debilitating that you don't even try. That's how you fail. You fail when you quit.
Mental Roadblock #4: I Can't Be Helped
This mindset assumes that you have to figure things out on your own. You get this idea in your head that for you to achieve success, things have to be revealed to you. You have to dig deep within. You’re the only one that can fix things in your life. Well, at least this is what you believe. You feel that for whatever reason, the only person you can truly rely on is yourself.
Thankfully, this isn't true. Thankfully, a lot of the challenges that you are facing, believe it or not, have been faced by other people. Maybe they handled these at a different time, at a different place, under different circumstances. Regardless, these people can help you if you asked.
They can help you personally on a one to one or some sort of mentorship arrangement. On the other hand, they can also help you through books they may have written or video courses they recorded. You can even be helped by simply reading blog posts or articles they have written.
No matter how you get the help, get it!
Your situation is not unique, nor is it special. Whatever challenge you're facing, others have faced it before and overcame it. You just need to find their experience. Either you reach out to them or you read stuff that they wrote.
A variation of this toxic mindset is the assumption that others won't help. Maybe they don't want their secret sauce coming out. Maybe they don't want new competitors. Well, those are just excuses you're giving yourself.
You really won't know for sure until you ask. And just because one person is stingy with information, it doesn't give you an excuse to stop. You can ask another person, and then another, and then another. Surely, not everybody will turn you down.
Mental Roadblock #5: I Don't Deserve Success
This is a very common toxic mindset. People, of course, would not admit to it, but deep down inside, they're thinking it.
Maybe they have failed a lot in the past. In fact, they think that they've screwed up so badly that they really do not deserve a break. They really do not deserve success. They end up defining themselves through the prism of their frustrations. They personalized their failures and setbacks in the rawest emotional terms.
For people with this mindset, failure is not just something that happens when people strive for greatness or goals, instead failure is some sort of cosmic punishment. It comes at the end of some sort of moral judgment and it burns deep. It cuts to the bones and cannot be escaped. Permanent. Final. Relentless in condemnation. Talk about stifling. Talk about paralyzing.
Others come from traumatic backgrounds. Their self-esteem is so low that they feel that they are not worth changing. They feel that others' needs come before theirs. They look at themselves as some sort of emotional doormat.
Please understand that the only person who can decide whether you deserve success or not is you. You call the shots. Nobody can judge you and say, "You don't deserve success. Somebody else does."
You have to claim that success and say that you deserve it because ultimately, this is self-judgment. You've been declaring yourself guilty all this time. Isn't it time to decide otherwise? You know how harsh it feels. You know the kind of lousy results you get when you do this. Why not change things up? Start today.
Mental Roadblock #6: I'm Perfect the Way I Am
Just as toxic is the mindset that you're perfect. You're the smartest person in the room, you're definitely the best looking, the whole nine yards.
While it's great to have a positive self-image and a healthy self-esteem, you should not let this trick you into thinking that you don't need help or that you don't need to make changes.
Make no mistake, on the road to success, you need to change. You're obviously not as successful as you would like now. You’re not as capable as you think. It’s hard to believe but it turns out that you haven’t quite figured everything out like you believe.
Change is required. This means having to let go of whatever inflated impressions of yourself you may have.
The antidote to this is very simple: admit that there is always room for improvement. This doesn’t make you a lesser person. This doesn’t have to mean some sort of defeat.
Mental Roadblock #7: I Need to Change... Tomorrow
Don't play this game with yourself. Don't, on the one hand, say to yourself that you need to change, and you are ready to do it and you're willing to do it, but you're going to wait until tomorrow.
You have to understand that if you're waiting to have time, you'll never have time. There will always be some sort of duty or responsibility or obligation that will pop up out of nowhere and you never get to making the changes that you need to make.
Similarly, tomorrow will never come. The moment you say that, "I'm going to do something, but I'll do it tomorrow," you set yourself up to lose because there will always be something of higher priority. There will be certain unexpected things that will show up that will knock you off track.
So, stop playing this game. Do it now. Make the changes now. Commit today. Take action in the here and now.
The great thing about starting now is pretty soon you get used to the challenges. By starting as soon as possible, you learn the lessons you need to learn and go through the hoops you need to go through sooner. If you’re going to go through this process anyway at some point in the future, why not get it over with now?
Mental Roadblock #8: Success and Money Aren't Everything
Isn't it interesting that the people who say that money isn't everything are usually people who want a lot of money? The same apply for people who tried and failed to achieve great success in their lives.
When you say these things to yourself, you're basically just engaging in sour graping. That's what you're doing.
You're saying, "Oh, it wasn't worth the hassle anyway. I'll focus on something else. There are higher values in life."
Well, if they were so valuable, why weren't you pursuing them in the first place? Why are you treating them now as some sort of consolation prize?
Stop playing this game with yourself. You're basically just giving yourself an excuse not to improve or shoot for greatness.
Mental Roadblock #9: Success is Just Not Worth It
This is a very tricky toxic mindset because it actually has many moving parts. Some people end with this conclusion because they feel that they don't want to sell out their real values.
Others would say, "I just want to preserve my soul, and I feel like I'm going to lose my soul in this wild dash for success." Others say that they don't want to lose their identity. “I just want to remain true to myself.” “I want to remain myself.”
How common are these sayings to you? Chances are, you’ve heard these many times. In fact, you might be saying this to yourself at some level or other or in some form or other.
Regardless of how you phrase it or how often you say these things, just because you repeat this thinking, it doesn’t make it go away. The bottom line? These are all excuses!
These are all excuses because success can be part of your identity. It can be part of your soul. It can be part of your core intrinsic values that you would never give up for anything. You're just giving yourself an excuse for not trying or for not trying again.
Maybe you got burned in the past. Maybe you got disappointed badly. Whatever the case may be, you can’t use the past as an excuse to keep you from doing something about your situation in the here and now.
Success is worth it because it improves you. It pushes you to be a more excellent person. It teaches you the value of sacrifice. It enables you to gain a sense of meaning in your day to day life. Living a life of purpose is one of the most important gifts you can ever give yourself.
When you take action every day, it is very empowering to realize that it leads somewhere big.
Mental Roadblock #10: I Don't Want to Turn Into Someone I Will Hate
This mindset is really rooted in a zero-sum mindset. What you're saying is, "I don't want to turn into someone I hate because when I achieve success, I necessarily rob it from somebody else." There are many ways to phrase this thinking but it all goes back to that same zero-sum game.
Let me tell you, there is no giant pie of success anywhere in the world. Just because your slice of the pie gets bigger, it doesn't necessarily mean that somebody else's slice gets smaller.
There are tremendous amounts of opportunities out there. Opportunities come and go at the blink of an eye, moment by moment. They are created and destroyed all the time.
Indeed, by striving for success and excellence, you can inspire others to do the same. Don't think that they will just envy you.
Because people who envy have a zero-sum game mindset. They envy others because they feel that the slice of the success pie that was otherwise due them is shrinking.
There's no such thing. That's nonsense.
Understand that when you choose to inspire others, you spread success because they can be motivated to achieve success. This is the precise opposite of the shrinking pie analogy.
If anything, you increase the size of the pie and ensure more slices for others if they want to. You do this because you inspire them.
