The Workday Mindset Podcast

When we think about a potential future scenario that makes us uncomfortable, our mind wants to “confront” the thought. It wants us to meet the thought on the thought’s terms and to accept the future scenario as true - even if it has no basis in fact - so that we can come up with a solution, just in case that future scenario actually happens.

When we confront thoughts like this, what we end up doing is breathing life into them and giving them power over us.

So instead of “confronting” a thought, in this episode we talk about a better way to address these thoughts - a way that helps us loosen the grip that a challenging thought has over us.

We all spend a lot of time trying to be consistent and trying to project a sense of consistency to other people. And we do that both because we think that inconsistency signals to others that we’re unfocused or undisciplined, and also because inconsistency can make us feel uncertain.

But in truth we need to embrace and make room for inconsistency in our life - because if we don’t make room for inconsistency, we leave no room for growth. By definition, growth is a state of consistently being inconsistent. Growth means that you are a version of yourself that is inconsistent with a previous version of you.

In this episode, we talk through why we cling to consistency, but also how we can start to embrace inconsistency and see it as the powerful mechanism for change that it is.

When we think about what we want for ourselves in the future, it’s natural for us to try to issue spot and for our mind to want to solve any problems that we see coming down the pipeline.

Our mind wants to think through all the little nooks and crannies related to events in the future so that we can feel like we’re prepared for everything that might come up - because if we feel like we’ve thought through things then that gives us a level of comfort and it helps us feel safe.

But the challenge we face when we look into the future like this is that it forces us to lose touch with the present moment. When we’re pulled into contemplating and trying to predict and solve for a future version of events, we shift from the present, where we have the ability to actually take action, to being stuck in the uncertainty of a future thought, where all we can do is think.

In this episode, we talk about how you can take a different approach that will leave you feeling empowered instead of stuck - and it involves shifting your mindset to a place where you’re taking ownership and responsibility for how you’re thinking moment to moment.

When we’re envisioning how a future version of events will play out, we tend to associate those events with “The Struggle.” We constantly hear messages about how “Life is hard”, “No pain no gain”, “Nothing in life is free” - and we also are instinctually wired to look for the warning signs of potential future struggles so that we can avoid them.

But this type of mindset can significantly impede our progress because if we believe that we have to struggle, our attention is drawn to the struggle - and we tend to find all sorts of evidence in our day to day to confirm that things must be hard, and in turn we make them hard.

In this episode, we cover how to notice when you’re telling yourself a story about your future that involves “The Struggle”, and how to reroute this thought away from internalizing The Struggle and toward processing challenges in a healthy way, and in a way that leaves room for inspiration and growth.

Changing the way we think is the catalyst for changing the way we act, so in this episode I want to introduce you to a simple concept that will put you on a path toward a better workday mindset.