Getting better

Hi!

Today’s piece is meant to be both uplifting and provide you with four concepts, along with corresponding rabbit holes of linked content to go down, around personal improvement. Just what we all need as we begin what feels like a “new year” with September around the corner.

With that - let’s dive in!

Completing a big goal is an opportunity for something new.

A few weeks ago, I talked about how achieving your big goal can also create a gap in your life. While that gap can feel uncertain and disorienting, my experiences tell me it’s also an opportunity to try something new. 

For example, my friend Caryn Davies — Attorney, Olympian, and currently the Chair of the U.S. Olympians and Paralympians Association — wrote me back and had this to say: 

Before my first Olympic Games, one of my more experienced teammates said to me, "No matter what happens in Athens, win or lose, you will be depressed. So you need to have a plan for what you're going to do with your life. You need structure to keep you sane in the months after." I never forgot that advice and it has worked out really well for me! Of course, two post-Olympics plans were easy: I went back to finish school (undergrad and law school). The other ones took a little more thought, but I've landed on my feet. And I feel grateful for that. -- Caryn

For more inspiration, check out this story from the New York Post about Olympians (including me) who went on to start completely new endeavors.

Olympic athletes can show us how to adapt to change.

All the athletes you saw kicking butt in Tokyo aren’t just super hard workers and massively talented (though they’re both those things). 

They’re also practicing a set of social-emotional skills that we all need in order to succeed — particularly in times when we have to keep adapting to change.

In education speak, these are known as “core SEL competencies”. (There are actually five identified by CASEL, but here I’ll focus on three of them.) 

They are:

• Self-awareness. The ability to recognize our strengths and weaknesses and when we should do things differently;

• Self-management. The ability to stay disciplined in pursuit of the big goal and not get too distracted by our own stress, emotions, and impulses, and;

• Responsible decision making. The ability to make constructive, responsible decisions that will help us succeed in the long run.

It’s funny, because those skills don’t sound quite as sexy as say, being able to pole vault yourself through the sky and land without breaking your spine, but they’re powerful skills — and they’re necessary to develop the growth mindset we need in order to achieve big things.

Read my full dive into this on the SXSW Education blog here.

Keep developing your growth mindset — it will inspire others.

Speaking of growth mindset, newly published research (supported by Classroom Champions and leveraging our cohorts of schools) shows that teacher growth mindset significantly impacts student mindset. 

In other words: if a teacher has a growth mindset, a student is more likely to develop a growth mindset, too. 

Even if you’re not a teacher, this is important to be aware of, because it seems logical that your own growth mindset can affect the other people around you — your kids, employees, mentees, and so on.

It’s a good reminder: If you use your mistakes and challenges as an opportunity to learn and grow, others may take their cue from you and do the same.

See the published paper here.

Meanwhile, go have some fun. 

If you’re a high achiever, it can be easy to get focused on solving problems and firefighting all day long. But I’ve learned that taking time away to do something quiet and brain clearing — in my case, fly fishing — actually helps me perform better. One of my favorite podcasts actually just got into the value of this for mental health. Dr. Anthony Huberman, a Stanford Medical School prof gets into this in the first half of his latest release, “Understanding & Conquering Depression.” It’s a must-listen if you’re intrigued by the neuroscience of mental health.

And read the full story on a few of my mental health strategies in Outside magazine, here.

- Steve