Mindset _ The New Psychology of Success - Carol S. Dweck [115]
They, in turn, can reassure you that they care about how you feel and will try to be more watchful. (“Are you kidding?” you say. “My spouse would never do that.” Well, you can request it directly, as I’ve sometimes done: “Please tell me that you care how I feel and you’ll try to be more watchful.”)
When you feel yourself losing it, you can learn to leave the room and write down your ugliest thoughts, followed by what is probably really happening (“She doesn’t understand this is important to me,” “He doesn’t know what to do when I start to blow”). When you feel calm enough, you can return to the situation.
You can also learn to loosen up on some of your rules, now that each one is not a test of your partner’s respect for you. With time, you might even gain a sense of humor about them. For example, if your spouse leaves some socks in the living room or puts the wrong things in the recycling bins, you might point at the offending items and ask sternly, “What is the meaning of this?” You might even have a good laugh.
When people drop the good–bad, strong–weak thinking that grows out of the fixed mindset, they’re better able to learn useful strategies that help with self-control. Every lapse doesn’t spell doom. It’s like anything else in the growth mindset. It’s a reminder that you’re an unfinished human being and a clue to how to do it better next time.
MAINTAINING CHANGE
Whether people change their mindset in order to further their career, heal from a loss, help their children thrive, lose weight, or control their anger, change needs to be maintained. It’s amazing—once a problem improves, people often stop doing what caused it to improve. Once you feel better, you stop taking your medicine.
But change doesn’t work that way. When you’ve lost weight, the issue doesn’t go away. Or when your child starts to love learning, the problem isn’t solved forever. Or when you and your partner start communicating better, that’s not the end of it. These changes have to be supported or they can go away faster than they appeared.
Maybe that’s why Alcoholics Anonymous tells people they will always be alcoholics—so they won’t become complacent and stop doing what they need to do to stay sober. It’s a way of saying, “You’ll always be vulnerable.”
This is why mindset change is not about picking up a few tricks. In fact, if someone stays inside a fixed mindset and uses the growth strategies, it can backfire.
Wes, a dad with a fixed mindset, was at his wit’s end. He’d come home exhausted from work every evening and his son, Mickey, would refuse to cooperate. Wes wanted quiet, but Mickey was noisy. Wes would warn him, but Mickey would continue what he was doing. Wes found him stubborn, unruly, and not respectful of Wes’s rights as a father. The whole scene would disintegrate into a shouting match and Mickey would end up being punished.
Finally, feeling he had nothing to lose, Wes tried some of the growth-oriented strategies. He showed respect for Mickey’s efforts and praised his strategies when he was empathic or helpful. The turnaround in Mickey’s behavior was dramatic.
But as soon as the turnaround took place, Wes stopped using the strategies. He had what he wanted and he expected it to just continue. When it didn’t, he became even angrier and more punitive than before. Mickey had shown he could behave and now refused to.
The same thing often happens with fixed-mindset couples who start communicating better. Marlene and Scott were what my husband and I call the Bickersons. All they did was bicker: “Why don’t you ever pick up after yourself?” “I might if you weren’t such a nag.” “I wouldn’t have to nag if you did what you were supposed to do.” “Who made you the judge of what I’m supposed to do?”
With counseling, Marlene and Scott stopped jumping on the negatives. More and more, they started rewarding the thoughtful things their partner did and the efforts their partner