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Inch by inch


I recently finished reading this book called Mindset by Carol Dweck. Mindset explores the theory of the "Growth Mindset" versus the "Fixed Mindset."

The Growth Mindset says that our traits are not fixed and that we can learn any skill or get better at anything we set our mind and efforts to. It takes away our excuses and changes our language from “I'm not good at that” to “I'm not good at that yet.” It changes our value system from a success/failure paradigm to a grow success inch-by-inch paradigm.

In our lives, I've found this not to only be important for the way I view myself, but also my language and actions towards my kids, in business and with friends. Last night, Cooper and I were cooking dinner for the family. We thought it would be fun to try and make melon balls, but it ended up not working and our melon balls looked more like slices and there was a giant mess everywhere. Coop looked at me and said, “If I fail at this, will dinner be ruined?” I looked at him square in the face and said, “Coop, as long as we’re learning, trying hard and having fun, that’s all I care about! We’re trying one tactic to make melon balls - and hey, we learned that this tool doesn’t work very well for that. Next time, we’ll try a different tool. High five for experimenting and learning!” We high-fived and moved on to setting the table. Later, Coop told me, "Even though I'm not a master at cooking yet and it was kind of hard, that miraculously was kind of fun, mom."

See, in the growth mindset, it’s not just about yourself, it’s also about how you encourage, teach, and train other people too. And having a growth mindset makes you take an inward look at issues about yourself and those you love. If my kids are afraid of failing, maybe it’s because I need to set up a path for success through learning, experimentation, and inch-by-inch growth. Maybe I need to focus more on the progress, not the outcome. Maybe I need to try more activities that none of us are good at yet, and demonstrate how failing is really just a step of learning and mastery.

This last year I've watched my life drastically change and most weeks I find myself in some new, scare-the-shit-outta-me, challenging new environment. Whether it’s performing, in business, creative work or parenting endeavors, my life is full of stuff that I’m not 100% amazing at…. yet. Sometimes I straight up suck at it when I first try. And the truth is, I hate sucking at stuff. I'm a classic fixed mindset-er. That's why when I was in 3rd grade and only made it 6 inches up the rope in gym-class, I vowed to never try it again. That's why, when at 8 I didn't show a natural aptitude for drawing, I convinced myself that visual art was just "not my thing." And although those are small things, they both held me back later in life when I had to overcome beliefs that I wasn't athletic or creative.

I didn't realize at the time that even things I showed no natural aptitude for could still be something I could be good at and even impressive at if I just kept at it. You see, everything in life takes practice. And the more scary shit I do, the better I get, inch-by-inch. This is the growth mindset. I know I can get better at whatever I try. I may not be amazing at it the first go around, but the 2nd, 3rd and 4th time I do it, I’ll be that much better at it. Eventually, I’ll master it. But I have to surrender myself to the process, and sucking at stuff is an unfortunate but necessary step of the process.

Last year, I listened to a full recording of a concert that Chris and I put on. As I listened to the performance, while there were many great twists and turns, I realized that I was jumping ahead of the beat in several places in the set. At first, my stomach lurched. “Aggh…” my internal monologue spoke, “I wish I was better at timing! Some people just have a natural knack for rhythm. I'll never put on a performance I'm truly proud of...” and on goes the downward inward spiral. But, after I got my internal voice under control, I got out my metronome and practiced those songs to the metronome until my voice was hoarse and my fingers hurt and I did that ongoing for weeks. I shared my struggle with Chris and he helped me come up with stage strategies to improve these points in the set. Together, we tackled the weakness and got better. Recently I listened to a full set of a performance we did and I had dramatically improved at timing and not jumping ahead. It wasn't a perfect performance, but it was an improved performance. And that is something to celebrate!

This last week, we were hanging out with our friend and our team’s amazing recording engineer, Rian Lewis. Rian and I were talking about writing music, producing, and how accepting that not everything is always going to be amazing is actually helpful to the creative process. He said, “Preciousness and perfection are the enemy of success.” He was talking about writing music - how elevating a song you write as too precious for improvement, feedback, or changes can hold you back as a musician.

But, the implications of this are much more far reaching. Preciousness and the aim for perfection can also the enemy of success in everything. Being able to look at your performances, work, management style and every other effort pragmatically, take advice and input, and work to improve the overall experience for those around us will only help us in the end!

So, I’m encouraging all of us to just try and let yourself suck for a minute. It’s ok! And then take a step back, ask yourself what you practically can do better the next time, implement it and you’ll suck a little less the next time. And on it goes.

Inch by inch, we’ll get it!

XOXO Jen Deale

Boss lady, Camp Crush, SBP Smoothies, Cooper & Bailey

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