These 7 Mindset Shifts Changed My Life (They Will For You Too)

I want to be honest with you about. something before we start. Most mindset. content is forgettable. Not because the. ideas are wrong, some of them are. genuinely good, but because they're. delivered like fortune cookies. They're. punchy, quotable, and gone by Tuesday. You read the book, you highlight the. line, you feel something shift, and then. life comes back. The argument, the. deadline, the 3:00 a.m. spiral, and the. highlight in the book means nothing. because the idea never got deep enough. to actually change anything. You might.

see yourself feel this way. You're still. reacting the same way, you're still. choosing the same kind of people, you're. still telling yourself the same stories. about why things aren't working. The. mindsets I'm going to share with you. today are actually going to shift. something and change something for you. for real. They're the ones that when. they finally landed, really landed in. the body, not just in the head, changed. something that stayed changed. Changed. how I see a difficult conversation, changed how I move through failure,

changed how I love people. There are. seven of them, and I'm going to give you. them straight with the science, with the. wisdom traditions behind them, and with. the stories from my own life, and with. the specific way you can use each one. immediately. Not next month, not when. things calm down, immediately. Let's get. started. Mindset one, pain is a. postcard, not a permanent address. The. first mindset that changed my life. sounds almost insultingly simple when I.

say it out loud, but I need you to hear. what's underneath. Pain is a postcard, not a permanent address. Here's what I. mean. When I was at my lowest, when the. career I thought I wanted had fallen. apart, when I had moved back home after. failing at the monastery in a way that. felt permanent, when I was surrounded by. people who had expected more from me, and I had expected more from myself, I. made a mistake that I think almost. everyone makes when things go badly.

I moved in. Not literally, mentally. I took the. painful chapter and turned it into my. identity. I stopped treating it like something. that was happening and started treating. it like something that was true. Like. the failure wasn't something I'd been. through. Like it was something I was. And here's. what the neuroscience says about that. distinction. Because it's not just. poetic, it's biological. The. psychologist Martin Seligman spent.

decades studying what he called. explanatory style, the way people. explain bad events to themselves. And he. found that when people experience. setbacks, they tend to explain them in. one of two fundamentally different ways. Some people explain setbacks as. temporary, specific, and external. This. happened in this situation for these. reasons. Others explain them as permanent, pervasive, and personal. This is who I am. This is what always.

happens. This is what I can always. expect. The first group recovers faster, more completely, and often stronger than. before. The second group gets stuck. Not because. they're weaker, because they moved into. the pain and started decorating. The Vedic tradition has a concept that. maps onto this perfectly. Anitya, the. Sanskrit word for impermanence. Nothing is permanent.

Not the good and not the bad. The. ancient teachers weren't saying this to. comfort you. They were saying it as a. precise description of reality. Everything passes. Everything. Including this. The postcard mindset is. this. When pain arrives, and it will, it. always does, you read the postcard, you sit with it, you feel it fully because unfelt pain. doesn't leave, it just goes underground,

but you do not unpack your bags. You do. not redecorate. You do not forward your. mail. You're a visitor in this moment, not a. resident. This too shall pass. Here's how you apply this immediately. The next time something painful arrives, a rejection, a failure, a loss, a. conversation that goes badly, ask. yourself one question before you do. anything else. Am I feeling this, or am I becoming it?

Feeling it is healthy, necessary, human. Becoming it is the decision, often. unconscious, always costly, to let a. moment define you instead of shape you. You are allowed to feel everything. You are not required to become it. Pain is a postcard. Read it, learn from it, then put it. down. Mindset two. You are not your thoughts. You are what.

you do with them. This one took me years. to actually understand. You may have. heard it before, but I don't just want. you to understand it intellectually. I. understood the theory almost. immediately, but to actually understand. it in the way that changes behavior, here's the version I was living before. this mindset. I believed that because I. thought something, it meant something. That because a thought arrived, you're. not good enough. They don't really. respect you. This is never going to.

work. It was delivering truth. I was taking delivery of every thought. like it was a certified letter from. reality. I was wrong. And it was costing me. everything. The cognitive psychologist. Aaron Beck, the founder of cognitive. behavioral therapy, one of the most. evidence-based psychological frameworks. we have, identified something he called. automatic thoughts. Rapid, reflexive. mental commentary that runs continuously. below the level of deliberate thinking.

And he found that in people experiencing. depression, anxiety, and relational. difficulties, these automatic thoughts. shared consistent characteristics. They were distorted. They were negative. They were experienced as unquestionable. truths. The thought arrives. It feels true. Therefore, it is true. Beck's entire therapeutic revolution was. built on one insight. The thought is not the truth.

The thought is a hypothesis. And like. any hypothesis, it can be tested. Marcus. Aurelius wrote in his Meditations, "You. have power over your mind, not outside. events. Realize this, and you will find. strength." Here's the immediate. application. It's three words, and I. want you to use them every time a. thought arrives that feels like an. indictment. Is this true? Not is this possible? Not could this be.

true? Is this actually demonstrably, evidentially true? And if you can't answer with concrete. evidence, if the thought is a feeling. dressed as a fact, you are not required. to take delivery. You are not your. thoughts. You are what you do with them. And what you do with them starts with. the radical act of questioning whether. they deserve your belief. Mindset three. This is a rough one. The people who.

trigger you the most are your greatest. teachers. I hate this one. It hurts me. It pains me. It worries me. I'm like, "God, do I have to learn it that way?". And I need to be careful with this one. because it can be misunderstood in a way. that causes genuine harm. I'm not saying. the people who hurt you deserve a medal, just to be clear. I'm not saying abuse. is a lesson you should be grateful for. I'm not saying that toxic behavior is. secretly your spiritual curriculum. What I am saying is something more.

specific and more useful than that. The emotional reactions that hit. hardest, the ones that seem. disproportionate, the ones that linger. longer than makes sense, the ones that. make you behave in ways you don't. recognize as yourself, are almost never fully about the present. moment. They are signals, and the person. who triggered the signal is pointing, without knowing it, at something that. was already there. Here's the psychology behind this.

The concept is called transference. First identified by Freud, but. significantly developed and validated by. modern relational therapists. Transference is the unconscious. redirection of feelings from a past. relationship onto a present one. When. someone in your life provokes a reaction. that feels too big, too intense, too. immediate, too hard to let go of, it is. frequently because they have activated a. wound that predates them entirely. The.

partner who dismisses your feelings. isn't just a dismissive partner. They. are also, for your nervous system, every. person who ever dismissed you. The. parent who didn't have the emotional. bandwidth, the teacher who made you feel. stupid, the friend who chose someone. else. The reaction you're having right. now is the sum of all those reactions, which means the most triggering people. in your life are giving you a map. A map. to the places that still need your. attention. A map to the wounds that.

haven't yet healed. A map to the. patterns that keep repeating, not. because you're broken, but because the. nervous system keeps seeking resolution. for what was never resolved. The. Youngian concept of the shadow is. essential here. Carl Jung believed that every person. carries a shadow, the parts of. themselves they've disowned, suppressed, or refused to acknowledge. And he. observed that what he most disliked in.

others is frequently what he most. refused to see in himself. The person. who infuriates you with their arrogance, do you have arrogance you've been. trained to suppress? The person whose neediness exhausts you, do you have needs you've convinced. yourself not to have? The person whose anger frightens you, do you have anger you've never allowed. yourself to feel? This is not. accusation. This is cartography. You're. mapping yourself through your reactions.

Here's how to use this sensitively. The next time someone triggers you, and. I mean really triggers you, the. disproportionate reaction, the one you. can't shake, instead of asking, "Why are. they like this?". ask two different questions. First, what specifically is being. activated in me right now? Not what did they do, what got. activated? Name the feeling as precisely. as you can. Second, where have I felt this before? Not in this relationship, earlier,

younger, way back when. When was the. first time you felt this particular. flavor of hurt? The answer to that. second question is not the person in. front of you. And when you know that, when you can see that trigger is a door. to something much older, you stop trying. to solve the present moment and start. attending to the actual source. That is where the real healing is. And the most aggravating person in your. life is often the one holding the door. open. Big [snorts] news, Juni just launched at.

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to claim your free can in store so you. can feel better and live better. Mindset. number [snorts] four, clarity is not. found, it's built through action. This is for anyone who's waiting. Waiting for the sign, waiting to feel. ready, waiting for the path to become. clear. Take the first step. I have to tell you. something that I wish someone told me 10. years earlier. The clarity is not coming. before the action. The clarity is the.

product of the action. You do not think. your way to a clear life. You live your way to a clear life. The. path doesn't become clear by just. looking. The path becomes clear by putting one. foot in front of the other and then it. appears. Here's the science. The. psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, whose work on flow states we've. referenced before, found that people. most commonly experience their deepest. sense of purpose and meaning not in.

moments of reflection, but in moments of. engaged activity. Not when they're. thinking about what they want to do, but. when they're doing it. This maps. directly onto what neuroscience now. knows about how the brain generates. meaning. Meaning is not a conclusion the. brain reaches after sufficient. contemplation. It is a byproduct of. engagement, of doing, creating, building, moving. The brain makes. meaning retrospectively from the raw.

material of lived experience. You cannot. think yourself into a meaningful life. You have to live yourself into one. The. ancient Sanskrit concept of karma is. entirely misunderstood in Western. culture. We think of karma as cosmic. justice. What goes around comes around. And there's truth to that, but in its. original philosophical context, karma. simply means action. Karma is the act. itself. And the Bhagavad Gita is perhaps. the world's most sophisticated treatise.

on action, specifically on the. relationship between action, identity, and liberation. Krishna's central. teaching to Arjun in the Gita is not. figure out your purpose and then act. It. is act without attachment to the. outcome, and purpose will reveal itself. Listen to that again, write it down, think about that. The action comes. first. The clarity follows. So many people are. paralyzed waiting to know, waiting to be. sure, waiting for the vision to be clear.

enough before they risk moving toward. it. And the painful irony is that the. waiting is the very thing preventing the. clarity from arriving. Here's the. immediate application, and it's simply. enough to do today. You don't need to. know the five-year plan. You just need to know your next five. steps. You don't need to know where. you'll be in 10 years. All you need to know. is what you're going to do next. Today, whatever it is, whether it's a phone.

call, an application, a conversation, an. hour spent doing the thing instead of. thinking about the thing, the clarity. you're waiting for is hiding inside the. action you keep postponing. Stop waiting. to know. Start doing to find out. Mindset five. You don't rise to your. goals, you fall to your environment. This one changed how I designed every. aspect of my daily life, and it is the. mindset that I think most people resist.

the hardest, because accepting it means. accepting something deeply. uncomfortable. Your willpower is not the. problem. Your environment is. Let me say. that again, because it runs counter to. everything productivity culture tells. you. Your willpower is not the problem. Your. environment is. The psychologist James. Clear, building on decades of behavioral. science, articulated something in Atomic. Habits that has now been validated. across hundreds of studies. Human. behavior is far less driven by conscious.

intention than we believe, and far more. driven by environmental cues. What we. see, what's accessible, what surround. us, what the people around us do. These. are the primary drivers of behavior. Not. goals, not motivation, not discipline. The person who wants to eat better, but. keeps their kitchen full of food that. undermines that goal, is not going to. succeed through willpower. >> [snorts]. >> The person who wants to read more, but. keeps their phone on their bedside table.

instead of a book, is not going to. succeed through discipline. The person who wants to grow, but. surrounds themselves exclusively with. people who are comfortable with. stagnation, is not going to succeed through. intention. This is not pessimism. This is power. Because if the environment is the. primary driver of behavior, then. designing your environment is the most. powerful thing you can do for your. goals. More powerful than motivation, more. powerful than a vision board, more. powerful than any amount of willpower.

The ancient Indian concept of sangha. understood this completely. Sangha or satsang literally means the. company of truth. This was the practice. of deliberately surrounding yourself. with people whose presence pulled you. toward your highest self. Not just. people you liked, people who by virtue. of who they were and how they lived made. it easier for you to be who you were.

trying to become. The tradition. understood that humans are profoundly, inevitably influenced by their. environment, especially their social. environment. And rather than fighting. that influence through discipline, the wisdom was to design the environment. so that the influence worked for you. rather than against you. Research by social psychologist Nicholas. Christakis at Yale confirmed this at. scale. In a landmark study tracking. thousands of people over decades, he.

found that behaviors, including. happiness, obesity, smoking, and even. loneliness spread through social. networks like contagion. You're not just influenced by your. friends. You are influenced by your. friends', friends', friends. Three degrees of separation. The. environment is that powerful. Here's the. immediate application. You don't have to. quit on all your friends. Three. questions to ask about your current. environment. First, does your physical. space make your most important behaviors.

easier or harder? If you want to. meditate, is there a clear, quiet space. that invites it? If you want to create, is your workspace organized around. creation? Or is everything arranged. around distraction? Second, does your social environment, the five people you spend the most time. with, make you more or less likely to. become who you're trying to be? Not. whether you love them, whether their. orbit is pulling you forward or holding. you in place. Third, what is the single.

easiest change you can make to your. environment today, right now, that would. make your most important goal more. likely? Not a dramatic thing, the. smallest possible environmental. adjustment that removes friction between. you and who you're trying to become. You. don't rise to your goals, as James Clear. says, you fall to your environment. So, build an environment worth falling to. Mindset six, the most dangerous story. you tell is the one about yourself.

Every person walking the planet is a. narrator of their own life. And like all. narrators, we're unreliable. We edit. We. emphasize certain chapters and minimize. others. We assign causation where. there's only correlation. We cast. ourselves in roles, sometimes the hero, sometimes the victim, always the. protagonist, and we mistake those roles. for truth. The story you tell about. yourself is the most powerful force in. your life. More powerful than your. circumstances, more powerful than your.

talent, more powerful than your. opportunities. Because the story decides. which opportunities you see, which risks you take, which. relationships you believe you deserve, and which version of your future you. allow yourself to move forward. The. psychologist Dan McAdams at Northwestern. University has spent his career studying. what he calls narrative identity. The. story each person constructs about who. they are and how they came to be that. way. And his research has found.

something both obvious and profound. The content of your self-narrative. predicts your psychological well-being, your resilience, and your capacity for. growth more reliably than almost any. other variable. Not what happened to you, how you story. what happened to you. Two people can go. through almost identical experiences, the difficult childhood, the. professional failure, the painful. relationship, and construct completely. different narratives from the same raw.

material. One person stories it as. evidence of their damage, the other. stories it as the origin of their depth. The experiences were similar. The. narrators made different choices. McAdams identified what he called the. redemption narrative, a story structure. where difficult chapters are told as. leading to growth, insight, or strength. He found that people who naturally. organize their self narratives around. redemption are significantly more.

psychologically healthy, more. generative, and more resilient than. those who organize around contamination, where a good thing was ruined, where a. hopeful beginning led to a bad end. The. difference is not in what happened. The difference is in how it is told. Here's what I want you to do with this. immediately. Think of the story you most. consistently tell about yourself. The one that comes up in therapy, or. with close friends, or at 3:00 a.m. when. you're being most honest. The one that explains why things are the.

way they are. Why you are the way you are. Now ask, is this the only story the. evidence supports? Or is it one story, one edit, one. emphasis of many that could be. constructed from the same facts? What would the story look like if you're. telling it as evidence of your strength. rather than your damage? As evidence of your wisdom rather than. your wounds? As a chapter rather than a. conclusion? You are the narrator. The raw material's.

fixed. The narration is yours. This. isn't toxic positivity. Choose a story that is honest, that. gives you somewhere to go. Mindset. seven, love is not a feeling, it is a. daily decision. A student once asked a. teacher, "What's the difference between I like. you and I love you?". The teacher replied, "When you like a. flower, you simply pluck it. But when you love a flower, you water it. every day. Love is a daily act, a daily decision,

not just a feeling. I've saved this one for last. deliberately because I think it is the. most important. And I think it is the. most misunderstood. And I think getting. it wrong is responsible for more human. suffering than almost anything else I. can name. Here's the story our culture. tells us about love. Love is a feeling that arrives, a. lightning bolt, a chemistry, a sense of. recognition. There you are. That happens. to you rather than being made by you.

And when the feeling is there, the. relationship works. And when the feeling. fades, which it inevitably does, because. all feelings are temporary, the relationship is over because the. love is gone. This story is everywhere. In every. rom-com and every love song and every. dating app designed around the initial. spark. It is so pervasive that most. people have never questioned it. The. psychologist Robert Sternberg at Yale. developed what he called the triangular. theory of love, a framework that. identifies three components of genuine.

durable love, passion, intimacy, and commitment. And his. research found that of the three, passion, the feeling, the spark, the. chemistry, has the shortest lifespan. It. peaks early, often within months of a. relationship beginning, and it declines. predictably regardless of how. compatible, how suited, or how deeply in. love two people genuinely are. This is. not a bug. This is biology. The. neurochemicals responsible for the early. intensity of romantic love, dopamine,

norepinephrine, are designed to initiate. bonding, not maintain it. They're a. starter motor, not an engine. The relationship that last, the ones. that deepen rather than erode, are built. on what remains after the starter motor. quiets. And what remains is not a. feeling. It is a series of daily, often mundane, often imperfect choices. The choice to be curious about this. person rather than certain about them.

The choice to repair the rupture. rather than catalog it. The choice to. see them fully. not just the version you fell for, but. the complex, contradictory, sometimes. maddening whole person in front of you. and choose them anyway. The difference. between a relationship that survives and. a relationship that dies is not the. absence of conflict. It was the presence. of what John Gottman calls bids for. connection. The small daily, often.

trivial attempts one person makes to. reach toward the other. A joke, a question, a touch, a look. And. the critical variable was whether those. bids were met. Turn toward in Gottman's. language rather than turned away from. The relationships that lasted were not. the ones with the most passion or the. best compatibility scores or the fewest. arguments. They were the ones where both. people, most of the time, in the small.

moments that feel like they don't count. choose to turn toward each other. That is not a feeling, that is a. practice. Here's the immediate. application. Think of the most important. relationship in your life right now and. ask, what is the smallest, most. available, most concrete bid for. connection I could make toward this. person today? Not a grand gesture not a. difficult conversation the smallest. genuine movement toward them.

A text that says, I was thinking of you. A question that shows you've been paying. attention. Five minutes of eye contact. without a phone in the room. The choice to be curious rather than. reactive in the next disagreement. Love. is a daily decision. Make it today. Here's what I know about mindsets. They don't change your life by being. interesting. They change your life by. being practiced. By being returned to. again and again until they stop being. ideas you agree with and start being the. lens through which you automatically.

see. That process takes time, takes. repetition, takes the courage to keep. applying an idea even when the situation. is hard and the easier thing is to react. from habit. Thank you so much for. listening today. I hope you'll share. this with a friend and I hope you'll. choose a mindset to practice for the. next 7 days. Remember, I'm forever in. your corner and I'm always rooting for. you. If you enjoyed this conversation, you're going to love my episode with. Arnold Schwarzenegger on how to make. your visions a reality and how to stop.

having a limited mindset. >> believed in plan B. If I start having a. plan B, that means now that I am saying, "Well, maybe this isn't working out.".