According to psychologist Carol Dweck’s hypothesis based on several studies, people believe that their abilities are based on their fixed innate ability (fixed mindset), while others believe that their achievements are established on effort, learning, and perseverance (growth mindset). These two types of conceptions have a bearing on our performance as well as in evaluating our failures.
If we have a fixed mindset we will believe that our disappointments come from our own abilities interpreting this as something negative. Having a growth mindset, we will take failure as part of our learning. Of course we are not aware of this type of attitude but it is observable in our outward behavior. Being fixed-minded we believe that our talent and intelligence are fixed traits of our personality and that we have a certain limit. On the contrary, by being growth minded we believe that our skills improve with practice and learning, firmly believing that we can be a superior skier if we try hard enough despite adversity.
These particular personality traits are susceptible to influence. If the instructor or coach enhances the learner or athlete with praise about how skilled or competent they are, they may develop fixed mindset patterns. If they are praised on the basis of effort they are more likely to display a growth mindset that promotes persistence despite failure. The strategy should be to encourage challenges, enjoy the effort as worthwhile and perceived to be beneficial, promote interest in mistakes made, and most importantly, inspire further learning.
Some skiers are fixated on proving their ability while others don’t care and keep learning. According to Dweck, there are two meanings of skill: a fixed skill that a person needs to legitimize, and a malleable skill that can be developed through learning. If we believe that our skills are fixed we will ski the same slopes in order to ‘not make mistakes’ and avoid exposing our shortcomings in challenging situations, and thus become a non-learner. We feel that skiing becomes too challenging therefore, we lose interest believing that we are not smart or talented enough. Conversely, being growth-minded, we will believe that going down the same slopes is boring so we choose new challenges because for us, success is learning, which is our priority.
Each skier’s mindset is his own belief. Our belief in ourselves directly affects the way we determine the skiers we want to be or the accomplishments we want to achieve. When we adopt a fixed mindset we interpret success as proving to ourselves that we are smart and capable skiers. To us, failure means an obstacle, a barrier, a hindrance. To make a mistake is to fall while descending a more difficult slope or to lose a race. Effort means something negative as we don’t believe we are skilled because if we were, we wouldn’t need to exert ourselves. But if we adopt the growth mindset we will tend to believe that our qualities can change by learning something better that contributes to our personal development. For us, failure is not trying, not improving our potential, and we firmly believe that trying hard is what makes us better skiers.
It is observable how, if we are intermediate skiers, we generally exclude ourselves from continuing to learn, and it is precisely at this stage that we face great challenges (new slopes, terrain, types of snow, and different types of turns). At the same time, we evaluate ourselves, usually with a fixed mindset, as to whether or not we are good skiers, whether or not we have achieved the desired mastery. We often become discouraged when in fact, we should adopt a growth mindset that will guide us through the process of continuing to learn and motivate to move on to the next stage.
Having a fixed mindset, we tend to not be able to walk away from the mistakes we make in our skiing or often don’t want to change it completely but do want to make some adjustments. We take lessons, putting the responsibility on the instructor to correct them. But logically, this type of decision doesn’t last long because we have neither the interest nor the will to learn, only to improve something. After a certain period of time, we resign ourselves and return to our previous skiing. The instructor’s comments, although they help to make more optimistic and realistic reasoning, don’t make us get out of our fixed mentality of thinking and our circle of evaluative thoughts. To move from a mindset of prejudice to one of growth, we must realize that a growth mindset can bring about a significant change in our mind and how we ski.
Attitude towards challenge
Being fixed mindset type skiers, when evaluating ourselves, we begin to fear challenges dismissing opportunities to learn. We believe that the ability is innate: we either have it or not. If we realize we have it, so much the better; if not, we think we don’t have the aptitude for the activity we are undertaking and therefore, do not set out to learn. We also may believe we are smart and skilled when we ski fast and perfect, without any mistakes or when something is easy for us but not for others. Our skiing goals are to do it fast and perfect.
Having a growth mindset, on the other hand, we strive when something is challenging, when we do what we couldn’t do before or when we practice for a while and start to feel our progress. Our goals are to learn something better, to face challenges, and to progress.
As fixed-minded personality about our own skiing we should know that, if we want to get out of the routine, everything will be a little more challenging each time. The skill we have one day on a downhill or in a competition may not be the same the next day when descending another slope or participating in another race.
Coping with failure according to perceived mentalities
If we adopt a fixed mindset in the face of negative results, the meaning of ‘failure’ is modified and may shift from the action of failing (“I fail”) to an identification with failure (“I am a failure”). Faced with a challenge, we might wonder why we would risk perceived ‘success’, understood as the confidence of going down a familiar slope or the familiarity of participating in a technical discipline, for possible ‘failure’, interpreted as going down an unfamiliar slope or the uncertainty of competing for the first time in a speed discipline.
For Dweck, even in the growth-minded person, failure can be a painful experience but it does not define him or her because he or she accepts that a challenge must be faced and learned from. In contrast, for the fixed mindset person failure can affect one’s Self and become a lasting trauma. If we have this type of mindset, we may try to repair our self-esteem after our failures, transferring blame or making excuses by utilizing Self defense mechanisms.
Concluding, being growth-minded skiers or athletes we are not discouraged by mistakes or failures. We don’t even think we have failed because we believe we are learning. In contrast, being fixed mindset, we take failures directly as a lack of ability.
