Why you're not moving forward in life...

Today I’m going to discuss the largest pandemic plaguing human society: the poverty of poor mindset.

Even if you’ve invested years into developing and sharpening your ability to do ‘good work’, I’m sorry to say, it’s still not enough.

As the saying goes - the skillset without the mindset will leave you upset.

On your journey to the promised land of entrepreneurial success, one thing rings true; the struggle is guaranteed, but the success isn’t’.

Can you be OK with this?

This isn’t a choice. In fact, it’s mandated that you become OK with this.

Remember in life - the question isn’t ‘who am I’, but rather ‘who am I becoming’?

Who we are right now, is not fixed.

This simple yet effective reframe helps you to recall that we’re not fixed as human beings. We’re not like the horse or giraffe that comes out pre-programmed to walk, communicate and survive.

We’re born as totally blank states, shaped by those around us in our formative years.

The prefrontal cortex of the human brain does not finish developing until you are twenty-five years old, giving you time to epigenetically respond to your environment.

This ‘shaping’ continues into adulthood. The difference is that we are forever ‘becoming’ something, or someone new.

I’ve met elderly family members in their 70’s and 80’s who hold the same belief systems about themselves and the world as they did when they were 16.

Their education stopped as soon as they left school.

They didn’t travel. They stayed within their safety zone. They followed the script and did as society expected of them.

What’s more, they didn’t embark on any personal development. None.

The beliefs, politics and ideologies they hold are carbon copies of their parents, peers and teachers from the 1950’s.

When they see someone like me, born in poverty, brought up in a religious cult but now surpassing that and living a seemingly extravagant lifestyle, running 7-figure businesses from Bali, Indonesia on my laptop - they think I got lucky.

They think I’m an outlier.

And they’re right.

But that shouldn’t be the case.

From a biological standpoint, I am exactly the same as them. I had almost the same start as them in life.

Hell, they probably got better grades in school than me. Some of them were engineers - way higher IQ than me.

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So, what separated us?

The fact that there is value in the willingness to take risks.

The constant pursuit of knowledge, layered on by total immersion in it’s application.

The faith that if you invest your time and energy into a skill set, you will get better at it.

Deviating from ‘the script’ wasn’t encouraged. The big wide world is scary, there’s constant unknowns and there’s safety in your tribe. In doing what your parents expected of you. There’s conformity, acceptance and repeatability.

Your Mondays look the same (desperate, and miserable) just as your weekends do, offering your chance of escapism from the ‘grind’.

To leave this dangerous safety zone (oxymoron mode, activated) requires a large WHY.

Recall Nietzsche: 'He who has a why to live for, can bear almost any how.'

If they’re in the ‘comfortably numb’ zone, they’ll never change. however, if they strive for more; more money, more freedom, more time, more experiences, more life, more quality of life, then they need to do something extraordinary to break the cycle.

This is where neuroplasticity comes in.

In her bestselling book ‘Mindset’ author Carol Dweck has a theory highlighting the importance of nurture, our environment, thoughts and the effort we put in when faced with new challenges.

If we want something bad enough, we need to face the music and overcome resistance to achieve it. Nothing worthwhile doing is ever easy.

It’s like a litmus test life puts us through before offering the reward (however big or small).

What does this look like?

Ask yourself: Can you push forward in the midst of mind shattering stress and crippling insecurity? Can you battle and overcome imposter syndrome, feel the fear, and do it anyway?

If you want to reach your end goal(s), then this is what is required of you.

It’s non optional. You have to become a person capable of doing seemingly extraordinary things.

As an entrepreneur, your reward for overcoming a problem, is a bigger problem.

But, with each boss you develop more resilience. More self confidence.

You start to learn through the process that you are capable of way more than what the limits of your societally programmed mind is conditioned to believe is possible.

You learn that the only boundaries in life are the ones you set for yourself.

So, how do we weaponize and embed the concepts of neuroplasticity into our day to day?

First, start with the objective: To develop an unbreakable mindset.

Easy to say, difficult to do.

This, like most things is a process, not an event.

As you face challenges (and believe me, you will), with each accomplishment you stack evidence on the fact that you’re able to learn the required skill sets and apply them to overcome difficulty.

As with most things, you start small, and scale. Nail it, then scale it.

You don’t tackle the level 100 boss, until you’re also at level 100, or at least at level 85 with the ability and confidence in your own ability to be skilled and resourceful enough to think outside of the box for creative solutions to tackle the big boss.

Each day, it’s up to you to get your head down and face whatever is standing in your way. If you turn and run. It will forever guard the gates. This counts as defeat by proxy.

As an entrepreneur, having no ‘boss’ to tell you what to do, how to do it, when to do it and the best way to do it can be challenging in and of itself.

My mental framework for this is: Whatever hinders your task, becomes your task.

Basically, whatever is standing between you and level 2, 3, 4 etc. becomes your task (or, your boss to defeat).

As you break down and tackle these perceived boundaries, it’s almost inevitable that you’ll start to develop a growth mindset.

Neurons that fire together, wire together.

What does this mean or have to do with anything?

In any new skill acquisition; say for example learning tennis, you go through a process of trial and error.

You need to develop the mental framework, the individual skills that stack over time with practise to make you a competent player.

Its through repetition, trial and error and relentless practise that your brain creates new neural pathways and synapses that make most of the moves seemingly automatic with time.

Like driving a car - when you were learning, you had to think about each moving part. Now, you can drive 200 miles in a trance like state and think nothing of it.

The same goes for the brain when it comes to building an unbreakable mindset.

Things that at one time would have rocked your world and ruined your day, become nothing but a bump on the road.

You’ve installed a new programme that proves to yourself that you’ve more than capable of tackling anything short of disastrous.

And, even if the event is disastrous, the mindset you’ve developed along the way will fuel you to get right back to the same point in 1/10th of the time, because you’ve proven to yourself that you can bend the world to your will.

You’ve stacked irrefutable evidence that you are larger than your current circumstances.

I’ve heard it said that ‘confidence without competence is delusion’.

Therefore, it’s your job to face these demons and prove you are competent. Maybe not at first, but with reps, you’ll develop and grow big enough to become confident in your newly acquired skill set.

You will have proven to yourself and those around you that you’re able to become the person able to deal and manage any obstacle.

In most cases, as author Ryan Holiday notes, the obstacle is the way.

Cultivating a growth mindset, in my opinion is one of the greatest side effects of entrepreneurship.

My one wish for the world, is that everyone can develop the internal self confidence that they are capable of almost anything, within the boundaries of physics and law.

So, what’s the take home message?

Do hard things.

Proactively seek them out.

Prove to yourself (and indirectly to those around you) that you’re unbreakable in your resolve to face hard things and overcome them.

The idea that your talent and intelligence are fixed is crazy and unfounded.

Remember, it doesn’t matter who you are today, it only matters who you want to become and the price you are willing to pay to get there.

Most times, the big scary fire breathing dragon usually turns out to be a wimp anyway. Perfectly defeatable, because you’re becoming an unstoppable force to a seemingly immovable object.

Believe, to achieve.

To your unstoppable success,

Lou Antonio

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