Amy Reed
Do people often tell you you’re an ambitious or highly motivated person – and you have no idea why?
Well, it’s all in your daily habits.
There’s a science behind being a “put-together” person – and it starts with the things you do and don’t do in your everyday life.
When you have a growth mindset, you’re energized by the idea of success. For you, you’re happy to put the work in to improve your skills and abilities.
When someone tells you you’re great at something, you know you can always do better. Why? Because you have a growth mindset!
You know that you can always improve yourself and your life with time, practice, and effort – and you’re not afraid to put the work in to find success.
Think you have a growth mindset? Let’s explore these 8 daily habits of people with a growth mindset to find out for sure!
1) You read a few pages of a book
Whether it’s fiction or non-fiction, reading daily is one of the most popular habits of successful people.
As research has found, reading improves your focus, memory, empathy, communication skills, and overall mental health.
Neuroscientists say that just 15 to 30 minutes of reading each day can promote better brain health and make you happier.
Reading daily can even boost your performance at work. With improved focus and better memory, you can make more considered decisions and remember important details with ease.
It can even help with presenting in meetings and job interviews by helping you speak more articulately.
2) You listen to audiobooks or podcasts
Just like reading, listening to audiobooks or podcasts is an opportunity to learn.
While many studies find they offer similar benefits to reading (like improved focus and memory), they have additional perks, too.
Having a podcast or audiobook play out loud builds listening skills, improves vocabulary, helps with pronunciation, and even improves your time management.
Some experts even say that listening to someone else reading aloud can help reduce negative thinking – which they found is particularly helpful for people with anxiety or depression.
3) You exercise for at least 30 minutes
Another activity you’ll participate in daily if you have a growth mindset is exercise.
I’m sure we’ve all heard about how beneficial daily exercise is for our body – but what about our brain?
Research has found that physical exercise helps you think, learn, problem-solve, and enjoy emotional balance. It also prevents deterioration of the brain and lessens feelings of anxiety.
So exercising doesn’t just make you fitter physically. It also helps you feel and function better mentally!
4) You journal thoughts from the day
When you’re in school, it’s pretty normal to have a diary you write in daily. To let off steam about who’s dating who and what Jessica said at lunch today.
But diaries aren’t just for kids to keep and hide under their pillow so their parents don’t read them.
In fact, almost any therapist will recommend keeping a journal – no matter your age.
As experts have found, journaling helps you prioritize problems, gain clarity on fears, identify negative behaviors, plan goals for the future, and reflect on the days passed.
All it takes is 15 minutes of journaling each day to feel the benefits, according to experts.
5) You make time for self-reflection
If journaling isn’t your thing, self-reflection will still be a part of your life if you have a growth mindset.
No matter how busy your day is, you’ll prioritize at least some alone time each day. It may be on your commute home or for ten minutes before bed.
A teacher I had in college always used to stay behind for 30 minutes after her last lesson. She used to call it her “thinking time”.
It was so important to her that she’d even schedule it in her calendar and tell students to make appointments around it!
When we asked her about it, she said it was her moment to take a step back and think deeply about her thoughts and actions during the school day.
Which, now I think about it, is a very, very developmental thing to do.
If you have something similar you do to self-reflect, whether that’s by traveling the last part of your commute in silence to think, or by meditating first thing in the morning – you have a growth mindset (just like my old teacher probably did).
6) You seek out new opportunities and make good use of your downtime
When you get home from work, you don’t just crash onto the sofa every night and go brain-dead in front of the TV or your phone until bedtime.
For you, your weekends and evenings are the time to make something of yourself – not just slob out (although that is important to do sometimes).
It could be small or big things, but every day you make time to plan for the future.
When you’re not working, you might call a family member, go for an evening walk, do something new to your apartment, research a new hobby, experiment with a new dish, or just plan what tomorrow will bring for you.
Because for you, sitting still (and I don’t just mean literally) isn’t something you enjoy doing all the time.
7) You say “Yes” more than you say “No”
When your boss asks you to take on a new project, do you jump at the opportunity to try something new?
When a friend invites you out with people you don’t know, do you immediately accept?
When a colleague suggests attending a hobby of theirs, do you give it a go?
Having a growth mindset doesn’t mean that you overstep your boundaries by saying yes to everything.
Like if you need to save money or work on your side hustle, you won’t say yes to every invite if your time/money is better spent elsewhere.
But it does mean stepping outside of your comfort zone sometimes to learn or try something new. Because for you, every day is a new opportunity to begin again.
When you have a growth mindset, the idea of trying new things excites you, rather than fills you with dread, and you generally enjoy the idea of giving new things a go.
8) You don’t just set goals at New Years
When you have a growth mindset, goal setting isn’t something obligatory you do because everyone else is doing it (ahem: on New Year’s Day).
Instead, it’s a daily, weekly, monthly habit for you that just comes naturally.
You’re the type of person who’s always making a “To achieve” list for the day.
Friends and family probably tell you you’re “always working on something” or describe you as highly ambitious.
Because you have a growth mindset – and you believe that every day is an opportunity to do something new or evaluate your progress.
Final thoughts
Having a growth mindset sometimes gets a bad rep.
Some people see it as meaning you’re a workaholic or overachiever – but, really, this couldn’t be further than the truth.
A growth mindset is just that – a mindset.
It’s a way of thinking that means you’re a positive, focused, motivated, and energized person.
Not someone who’s materialistic, never satisfied, or fully on board with “hustle culture” (which many experts have found to be toxic for your mental health over time).
Instead, it means someone who lives life to the fullest, is very in touch with the person they are (and want to be), and takes every opportunity to learn something new!
