Mindset _ The New Psychology of Success - Carol S. Dweck [48]
Here’s how failure motivated Sergio Garcia, another golden boy with mindset issues. Garcia had taken the golf world by storm with his great shots and his charming, boyish ways; he seemed like a younger Tiger. But when his performance took a dive, so did his charm. He fired caddie after caddie, blaming them for everything that went wrong. He once blamed his shoe when he slipped and missed a shot. To punish the shoe, he threw it and kicked it. Unfortunately, he almost hit an official. These are the ingenious remedies for failure in the fixed mindset.
TAKING CHARGE OF SUCCESS
Finding #3: People with the growth mindset in sports (as in pre-med chemistry) took charge of the processes that bring success—and that maintain it.
How come Michael Jordan’s skill didn’t seem to decline with age? He did lose some stamina and agility with age, but to compensate, he worked even harder on conditioning and on his moves, like the turnaround jump shot and his celebrated fallaway jumper. He came into the league as a slam-dunker and he left as the most complete player ever to grace the game.
Woods, too, takes charge of the process. Golf is like a wayward lover. When you think you’ve conquered her, she will certainly desert you. Butch Harmon, the renowned coach, says “the golf swing is just about the farthest thing from a perfectible discipline in athletics. . . . The most reliable swings are only relatively repeatable. They never stop being works in progress.” That’s why even the biggest golf star wins only a fraction of the time, and may not win for long periods of time (which happened to Woods in the 2003 and 2004 seasons). And that’s also why taking charge of the process is so crucial.
With this in mind, Tiger’s dad made sure to teach him how to manage his attention and his course strategy. Mr. Woods would make loud noises or throw things just as little Tiger was about to swing. This helped him become less distractible. (Do we know someone else who could have profited from this training?) When Tiger was three years old, his dad was already teaching him to think about course management. After Tiger drove the ball behind a big clump of trees, Mr. Woods asked the toddler what his plan was.
Woods carries on what his dad started by taking control of all parts of his game. He experiments constantly with what works and what doesn’t, but he also has a long-term plan that guides him: “I know my game. I know what I want to achieve, I know how to get there.”
Like Michael Jordan, Woods manages his motivation. He does this by making his practice into fun: “I love working on shots, carving them this way and that, and proving to myself that I can hit a certain shot on command.” And he does it by thinking of a rival out there somewhere who will challenge him: “He’s twelve. I have to give myself a reason to work so hard. He’s out there somewhere. He’s twelve.”
Mark O’Meara, Woods’s golf partner and friend, had a choice. It’s not easy to play beside someone as extraordinary as Woods. O’Meara’s choice was this: He could feel jealous of and diminished by Woods’s superior play, or he could learn from it. He chose the latter path. O’Meara was one of those talented players who never seemed to fulfill his potential. His choice—to take charge of his game—turned him around.
At the age of twenty-one, Woods had won the Masters Tournament. That night, he slept with his arms around his prize, the famous green jacket. One year later, he put a green jacket on Mark O’Meara.
From McEnroe, we hear little talk of taking control. When he was on top, we hear little mention of working on his game to stay on top. When he was doing poorly, we hear little self-reflection or analysis (except to pin the blame). For example, when he didn’t do as well as expected for part of ’82, we hear that “little things happened that kept me off my game for weeks at a time and prevented