7 Unhelpful Mindsets That Sabotage Our Success and Happiness?
We all depend on our mental strength when coping with stressful events. However, sometimes we limit that quality. That’s why we should pay attention to the things that undercut our mental strength. Only in that way we can increase our resilience.
One of the best ways to achieve that is to learn how to think accurately and flexibly during challenges and unpleasant situations.
If you are a resilient thinker, you will solve your problems quickly, and when some strategy or idea goes wrong you will quickly switch to Plan B. What’s more, you won’t see stress response as a threat, but as a challenge.
Here are several styles of thinking that interfere with your mental strength and sabotage your success and happiness.
1. Imposter Syndrome
If you have this syndrome it means you want to trick colleagues, competitors, or peers that you are good at something, when in reality you don’t think you’re as good as you say you are. That’s because you can’t accept your successes.
According to one research, imposter syndrome is a combination of maladaptive perfectionism and low efficacy.
2. Low Efficacy
Efficacy is actually your confidence. So, if you have low efficacy, you think you’re not able to solve some life or work challenge and succeed. For example, you are not confident enough to lead a new committee although you had the confidence to negotiate the contract.
On the other hand, high efficacy activates planning, acceptance, positive reframing, and other adaptive coping strategies.
It allows you to create new products, identify new business opportunities, commercialize ideas, think creatively, and persevere under pressure and stress.
3. Fixed Mindset
Having a mindset like this one means doubting your ability to learn new skills and tasks. This, in turn, compromises your mental strength. You’re convinced you are not capable of learning anything more than you already know.
4. Poor Thinking Habits
If you trap yourself into thinking a specific way, you’ll limit your resilience and ability to use your mental strength.
For example, all-or-nothing thinking, mind reading, jumping to conclusions, blaming others without reason, or taking the blame for everything. These are the thinking habits you should avoid.
5. Blaming Stress for Everything
Even though stress is harmful to your health, you shouldn’t blame it for every harm in your life. This will prevent you from functioning. So, instead of focusing on the negative side of stress, try finding the positive things stress can do.
For example, stress can sometimes motivate you to improve. This, in turn, will help you be less anxious and more satisfied with your life.
6. Worst Case Scenario
Catastrophizing is jumping to the worst-case scenario whenever a stressful situation occurs. But, this limits your ability to act. Usually, you think in this way when tired, stressed out, depleted, or when something valuable is at stake (such as your reputation).
7. Pessimistic Outlook
If you are a pessimistic thinker, you expect bad things to happen and you blame yourself for most of them. You think some stressful event will last forever, affecting every part of your life.
And, when something good happens, you explain it by saying it’s only luck. This way of thinking is linked to an increased risk of anxiety, depression, helplessness, and hopelessness.
Final Words
The way you think affects your emotions and ability to act under stress. That’s why you should avoid these unhelpful mindsets and focus on more positive ones.
