How to Develop a Winning Mindset, According to the Lead Performance Psychologist for the Navy SEALs
Performance psychologist Eric Potterat explains in his new book, 'Learned Excellence,' how the world's best performers build unstoppable mindsets.
BY TIM CRINO, SENIOR EDITOR, INC.@TIMCRINO
As the lead performance psychologist for the Navy SEALs and the Los Angeles Dodgers and a consultant to thousands of top athletes, business leaders, military operators, and first responders, Eric Potteratt knows a thing or two about the importance of mindset. He's teamed up with Alan Eagle--a Google sales and communications veteran who has co-authored the best-selling books How Google Works and Trillion Dollar Coach--to share his expertise. Their new book, Learned Excellence: Mental Disciplines for Leading and Winning from the World's Top Performers, is on sale now. Here, the authors share the parts of the book that they find most useful to entrepreneurs:
We frequently hear and read about the importance of mindset. There's a growth mindset, a grit mindset, a warrior mindset, and so on. Having the right mindset is critical to achieving excellence, but many of us just go with the mindset we wake up with, the one we have developed based on our personality, upbringing, family, and other factors. We may tweak it around the edges, but that's about it. After all, it's gotten us this far.
The best performers see mindset differently. To them, mindset is not a default, it's a choice. They don't just accept and tweak their mindset. Rather, they define the best mindset for each of their roles in life, intentionally transition into those mindsets, and actively practice them through their attitude, effort, and behavior.
Embrace Multiple Mindsets
We each play different roles in life: work, partner, parent, sibling, child, friend, teammate. Each of those roles can demand a different mindset for success. For example, adopting a gritty, competitive, ambitious mindset may be great for work or sports, but is generally not a recipe for success as a partner or parent.
To be excellent in each of your roles, define the best mindset for that role. Pick three to five words that describe the mindset you want to inhabit. What are the markers exhibited by the most successful people in that role, the ones you admire the most? These may not describe your natural mindset--they may be aspirational. Write the markers down and memorize them. When you are in that role, they define who you want to be.
Learn How to Switch Mindsets
You don't necessarily want to bring your work mindset home with you, so adopt a standard routine when transitioning between roles. Think of yourself as a dimmer switch on a light. When you are coming home from work, dim down your work mindset and light up your home mindset. You could do this via music--hard-charging, energetic tunes on your way to work, more chill stuff on your way home--or by simply repeating your mindset markers to yourself a few times. It doesn't matter what your routine is, just that you have one.
Practice Makes Perfect
Finally, you need to practice your chosen mindset by expressing it through your attitude, effort, and behavior. These are the only things in life you can control. Anytime you run into adversity, activate your chosen mindset through all three.
For example, if you strive for a growth mindset, you want to perceive challenges and setbacks as learning opportunities. When you hit a rough spot, set your attitude by telling yourself, out loud if it helps, I'm going to learn from this and get better. Your default may be to retreat and stop trying; instead, double down on your effort. Learn from what went wrong so you can modify your behavior and improve.
The takeaway
Mindset is a choice. Define the mindset you want to adopt for each of your roles in life, transition into that mindset by repeating its key characteristics as you transition, and practice it through attitude, effort, and behavior. This is how the very best performers become the best.