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Christopher Daly
Chris is the President and Chief Marketing Officer for Mindset 24/7. Chris has a 30 year career in sales and marketing working with major brands and small business. Over the course of his career he has observed and learned from a broad array of leadership styles and personality and studied what makes organizations exceptional. Chris lives in Columbus, Ohio and is a graduate of The Ohio State University and University of Cincinnati.
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Growth Mindset | The Grateful Habit of Dropping Dead Weight
A Growth Mindset that is Grateful does an excellent job dropping dead weight in your mind. We all carry dead weight with us, things we slip into our mental backpack and carry around with us. It's time to drop it.
A Growth Mindset that is Grateful does an excellent job dropping dead weight in your mind so you can maintain a strong work ethic. We all carry dead weight with us, things we slip into our mental backpack, and carry around with us. Sometimes we carry that weight around for a few days and other things can be decades of dead weight. The problem with dead weight is that every ounce of it you add ends up becoming pounds you have to carry.
Where in the world is that dead weight coming from?
Is Your Past Haunting You?
There are multiple types of dead weight you carry around in your head. Some of it is past relationships or situations that have not worked out for you and eat away at you a little bit every day. Some of it is personal relationships that have a way of dragging you down. Grateful people are often very giving and even to the point of not asking anything in return. But when the unappreciative become dead weight in your bag, it’s time to take it out. You may have missed a sales goal for the quarter and job stress is on your mind. You may have made a mistake on the job and a crew member got injured. Maybe you had a bad experience with a colleague or peer that just rubbed you the wrong way. Those are all things that weigh a lot on your mind if you let them and they are all in the past and virtually nothing you can do about them.
THE DISTRACTIONS OF A DIGITALLY CONNECTED LIFE
Another type of dead weight are distractions. Taxes are due. You have yard work to do to keep up with the Jones’ nextdoor or you have minor things that need to be done that snowball into mountains of dead weight. People or Situations that constantly need your time but deliver really no value back to you are part of that dead weight. Those Pokemon video games you are still playing at 42 years old in your basement mancave. One of my personal favorites is constantly organizing your organizing. And do you really need 7 Social Media accounts to connect to the same 50 people??? It makes your head spin.
the personal habits of your fixed mindset
Finally, there is the deadweight that NOBODY wants to talk about and that is all of your really bad habits. Not exercising. Late night snacks that turn into a smorgasbord of leftovers. Not keeping up with your bills. Not returning phone calls to the folks. Taking long breaks at work that deliver nothing. Sitting around work Complaining about everything, Blaming other people for everything and Denying you do it at all. Or worst of all that evil little goblin in your head casting doubt on you in every way it can:
- Not a good enough friend.
- Not a good enough spouse.
- Not a good enough employee.
- Not a good enough boss.
- Not a good enough person.
Your bad habits of mismanaging your time, talent and treasure is yet the final stone that goes in your bag before you feel like it will break your back.
The big drawback of carrying around so much dead weight is that it stomps out the foundational habit of a Growth Mindset – being Grateful. You are not Grateful for the unnecessary weight so it is time to kick it to the curb.
How to Drop the Dead Weight in Your Head
Given this is a free blog, we are going to give you a 2 for 1 today on how to get rid of the dead weight: Urgent/Important and Yes/No.
THE EISENHOWER METHOD OF Urgent Important
Most of us were not even born when President Dwight David Eisenhower was in office. As a General he used a brilliant method for handling dead weight that is still used almost 80 years later: the Urgent/Important Matrix.
The Urgent Important matrix is a simple 4 square solution to decide what to keep and what to ditch. If something is Urgent and Important – get it done today. If something is Urgent but Not Important push it to the end of the day. If something is Not Urgent but Important push it to tomorrow. And for those things that are Not Urgent and Not Important – time to take them out of the bag and toss them away.
Urgent / Important These are the things you need to DO
| Not Urgent / Important These are the things you PLAN to do
|
Urgent / Not Important These are the things you DELEGATE
| Not Urgent / Not Important These are the things you DISCARD
|
The Urgent/Important 4Square is a fast and easy way to work through your mental baggage and ditch it. Self Talk is a powerful ally; it’s okay to tell yourself to stop Blaming. It’s okay to tell yourself, “You’re blaming again.” It’s okay to put down the video games, they are harming your important relationships. It’s okay to not return the 67 unanswered text messages from the person who wants nothing but to text – you. It’s okay to shutdown a Social Media profile – do we really need 6 of them? Urgent/Important is a great tool for emptying the dead weight and weighing everything as it comes to you.
THE YES/NO METHOD
Yes/No is more of a blunt instrument; Does the thing you are carrying in your backpack give you anything? If the answer is Yes – hold on to it. If the answer is no, well, out it goes. It is as simple as this:
| Baggage | Yes | No |
| Blaming at the water cooler | X | |
| Complaining at the water cooler | X | |
| Paying My Bills | X | |
| Answering 67 texts from that guy in high school I never talk to | X | |
| Mowing the lawn | X | |
| Taking a run, hitting the gym, talking a walk | X | |
| Taking time to prepare healthy foods | X | |
| Taking time for an online learning course | X | |
| Trying to get to 5000 friends on Social Media | X | |
| Being honked off at that jerk in the fender bender from 15 years ago… | X | |
| Calling Mom even though she has not called me | X | |
| Playing SOCOM on-line with my unemployed cousin in my uncle’s basement | X | |
| Thinking about the wins and good things – firing up Positive Self Talk | X | |
| Stirring up about that guy in the office who keeps saying 10-4 and does not hear a thing you say | X | |
| Binge watching movies on-line until 2 am | X |
Simple Y/N lets you sort out the baggage and habits that are holding you back, wearing you down and keeping you from being Grateful. Grateful is the foundation of the Growth Mindset; it’s a critical attitude to shed negativity and focus on the good things and taking care of yourself and the people you care about.
Now you have TWO tools (you are welcome). Feel free to download a sheet that has them both (one less task you have to do – make your own).
What do you think?