The importance of your mindset may not be anything new, but it means everything for your personal and professional success.
How many times have you heard,” Mindset is everything?” Quite a few, right? But does it seem as though you’re hearing about the importance of mindset a lot more lately? There’s a good reason for that.
It’s the Type of Mindset That Matters
Chances are, because you’ve been thinking about making a change in the way you practice law, you’ve been Googling quite a bit. That means you’re likely using words like “success and positive thinking” along with, “how to love your law practice.” That’s why you’ll find “mindset” coming up quite a bit in your search results.
While your mindset represents the beliefs and attitudes that influence your actions, as it turns out there’s a way to reshape those, so you can possess the type of mindset that’s the most important component for your success. What you need is a growth mindset that’ll provide you with these incredibly empowering results.
Making Up Your Mind(set)
You can’t talk about mindset without mentioning the powerful work of psychologist and Stanford University researcher, Carol Dweck. Her seminal work linking mindset to success spawned a 2006 book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, which reflected an entirely new outlook on success, namely, that there are two types of mindsets: growth and fixed. (A growth mindset is the one you want to be on the track for success in all things.)
Dr. Dweck notes the distinct difference between the two mindsets is that “In a growth mindset, challenges are exciting rather than threatening. So rather than thinking, oh, I’m going to reveal my weaknesses, you say, Wow, here’s a chance to grow.”
Why is that so profound? Because you can choose your mindset. You don’t have to feel constrained by your tendencies toward a fixed mindset because you can choose to change it when you can acknowledge there’s a choice. And this is when you’ll redefine success for yourself.
As Professor Dweck says, “ In one world—the world of fixed traits—success is about proving you're smart or talented. Validating yourself. In the other—the world of changing qualities—it's about stretching yourself to learn something new.”
People with a growth mindset have everything they need for success because when you possess a growth mindset you’re motivated to work hard, develop, and persist, and you believe your abilities and outcomes are influenced by hard work. And that links directly to success.
In a recent Forbes article, Why A Growth Mindset Is Essential For Career Success, embracing change featured heavily in the growth mindset because “a growth mentality assumes that views can be changed when they no longer allow us to achieve our goals. Everyone can change and grow through experience and practice.” This is an incredibly important realization to have when you’re looking to reinvent yourself into a new way of practicing law, or even a new area of law.
And if we’ve learned anything in our 15+ years serving over 3,030 lawyers, it’s the importance of mindset. It’s not overstating it to say the success of your law practice is inextricably intertwined with your mindset. And how do you get into that right mindset?
The NLBM Program + Positive Mindset = Transformed Law Practice
Adopting a mindset that will support all of your efforts in realizing your goal of transforming your law practice is all about clarity, choices, values, and potential. How about if we show you, rather than tell you?
And we’ll walk beside you as you venture forth into this whole new experience that is going to energize you. How? We’re glad you asked!
How NLBM Supports Your Mindset Development
Maintaining a positive mindset takes some work, but that’s one of our specialty areas as we support you on your journey to transforming your law practice.
We’re going to help you overcome any sort of negative mindset you may have that can potentially prevent you from being successful in building your law business. When you work with your NLBM coach you’ll be encouraged to look at what has been holding you back. (See NLBM Coaches Get Your Law Practice Into Shape blog.)
The coaches at NLBM subscribe to the philosophy, “What you focus on expands” and “Where your attention goes, energy flows.” This goes to mindset and goals with a big dose of positivity, which benefits you greatly as you go through each step of the NLBM program. You’re likely to experience a breakthrough or two along the way, just like Member Lawyer Natalie Henry.
Natalie worked hard on her mindset, which allowed her to experience a huge mental and financial breakthrough. Now she’s fueled by the high-octane knowledge that her law practice is successful with plenty of clients to serve in the exact way she’s always envisioned serving them. The same thing can happen for you. Now the question is…
“What’s holding you back from taking that next step?”
Let’s talk about a new way to practice law.