Tag Archives: positive psychology

Thank you Eleanor Roosevelt.

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I’ve been reading a lot lately about the nature of choice.  We live in a society where there sometimes is a tendency to “blame” others for our own behavior. “The devil made me do it.”  We all make mistakes, it’s the choices we make after them that really matter.

choice/noun

noun: choice; plural noun: choices
  1. an act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities.
I know some people subscribe to a philosophy that our lives are just laid out in front of us with no choices…all fate.  All the time.  That’s fine if that’s working for you.  I just happen to wholeheartedly disagree.  We have free will.  We choose how to respond.  We can choose who we want to be. We can choose whether or not to let someone provoke bad behavior in us. We can choose to learn more. We choose how to utilize new knowledge. Knowledge is power in every circumstance even sometimes when it’s painful.

When I realized that every minute of every day I have a choice, even though it seems so simple, I really felt like I had been liberated.

We have the privilege of getting to make choices (good or bad) and learn from them and get up another day and make another round of choices.  We are choice makers—not constant victims of circumstance.  Fabulous, huh?

Well, not entirely, because when I began to study about the nature of choice it put a bunch of victim crap I’ve carried around back on my own broad shoulders. Wait, I can’t dump that on someone else?  Someone didn’t DO that to me, that was my choice?  I didn’t want to think about it.  Choosing is not an easy process, but that’s the way the universe operates.  I tried to unlearn and block out what I was reading.  I just couldn’t, the genie was out of the bottle and now I’m grateful.

Every moment of every day we have choices to make.

choice eleanor roosevelt lisa lillibridge

When we make choices with personal authority and ownership they can actually help us learn a lot about ourselves.  I don’t know about you, but I will spend my lifetime trying to understand Lisa.  She’s actually a total pain in the ass—however, the more I know about her, the more I know and that’s never a bad thing…even if it’s painful in the short term.

growth mindset vs. fixed mindset

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brain changes carol dweck lisa lillibridge

When I read through these traits I was struck by a few things.

1. I’m so grateful to know that a fixed mindset doesn’t have to remain FIXED.  Think about it?  FIXED means unchangeable.  WHO POSSIBLY WANTS TO HAVE A BRAIN THAT IS UNCHANGEABLE?

2. I get really tired of people throwing up their hands and saying, “that’s just the way I am, the way I learn, talk and so on…so get used to it”.  No. I won’t, because it’s untrue.  However, this statement is—we have to believe that change is possible or real growth is way less likely to occur.

Neuroplasticity allows our brains to create new pathways by doing things differently.  It isn’t simple, I understand. However, the good news is that meaningful change in our lives is BOTH very difficult AND very possible.  One of the growth mindset traits: sees effort as necessary.

“Neuroplasticity refers to the potential that the brain has to reorganize by creating new neural pathways to adapt, as it needs.”    —http://www.whatisneuroplasticity.com/

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT NEUROPLASTICITY

“The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile”

― Tal Ben-Shahar

(Happier: Learn the Secrets to Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment)

It’s so necessary to feed our brains novel experiences, thoughts and ideas for growth and it sure makes life a helluva lot more interesting.  Don’t you think?

Try something new today.  Your brain will thank you.