Governing Mindsets: Always Go To What Works

Sometimes great things can be accomplished by making tiny changes and adjustments. One of those little changes concerns how we think and the mindsets that get born in us as a result of our way of life.

The mind accommodates many different mindsets that become activated by the nature of activity or situation that we are in. If you were to only have one mindset, however, there is one that you would not want to ever be without, that when present and developed, constitutes the most constructive and positively influential mental framework to have: The What Works Mindset.

Every moment in our life presents two choices: The choice to progress and find constructive ways forward; or the choice to let ourselves or others down by thinking or acting in not constructive ways. Think for a moment – just for a moment – about the vast numbers of people that at this very moment think about what’s wrong and what does not work. How many people think about what’s wrong with themselves and what’s wrong with someone else. Or what is wrong with a relationship, or what is wrong with a project or what is wrong with the world.

The thing about thinking is that it is so easy to think about what’s wrong and what does not work, isn’t it? It is much more challenging but hugely rewarding to adopt the powerful discipline of thinking as a first principle about what is right and what does work. The way is to know what does not work and think about what does work and what can work rather than the other way around.

It may, at first, come across as a subtle difference, but it is a huge difference. Thinking is an energizing, powering process. Therefore thinking habitually about what does not work powers the problem and potentially makes it worse than it already is. I am sure that you can relate to what is being written from your life’s experience.

Thinking about what works as a first principle is one of life’s greatest skills. We live in incredible times, characterized by the greatest challenges that humanity ever encountered and also by the greatest opportunities. The human capability is evolving in leaps and bounds and so is our ability to discover innovative ways and solutions to help forge a bright future.

A ‘what is not working’ mindset as a prime focus attracts low grade energies that produce mental fog, thus suppressing our limitless creative powers. A ‘what works’, ‘what can work better’, ‘what can work different’ mindset attracts new, vibrant energies from the future – unused energies that empower the human mind and enhance our natural creative capabilities.

Thomas Edison tried thousands of light bulbs until he discovered the one that worked. What made it possible was his belief in a working concept. And here is the pivot point of the attitude that is championed here: The ‘what works’ way works when attached to concepts or ideas that are feasible and doable . It is a potent search and discovery process – not an empty thought process.

Next time – perhaps today – when you need to deal into a situation where something does not work as it should or as you would like it to, ask yourself: “what is the one thing that does work here?” “what can work better if we try or change this or that?” Insist, persist, push and struggle as much as is needed to get to that mental vantage point of being able to see beyond the immediate horizon of how you may normally think, into the horizon of new possibilities waiting to be discovered.

In this one life that we have, time and energy are two of the most precious resources at our disposal. Spend them in what works rather than wasting them in consuming processes about what is not working. And in doing so experience a connection to new dimension of time and new, revitalizing energies – and a new way of life that will make you a far more effective individual.

Addendum

In case you may be looking for some clarity about what exactly is the mind, a good starting point is that the mind is the unseen life of the combined resultants of our mental processes. How we use the emotions; our attitudes; the living results of our many experiences through the course of our life; the way we employ our instincts and the nature and quality of energies that are attracted to our mental processes – flavours and traces of all of these and more merge and combine to form the mind. So some minds can be utterly confused as a result of contradicting and conflicting signals and influences that play their different tunes within the mind’s space; while other minds are lucid, ‘together’, crystal clear and highly focused. It depends on a person’s life style, processes and objectives.

Then there are commonly used phrases such as ‘making up one’s mind’, ‘what’s on your mind?’, ‘do you mind?’ and ‘presence of mind’. The most important point of view here is that the human has a choice. We can make up our minds in such a way as to have a presence of mind in the form of harmonious blends of fields of vibrant energy that lives in and above the head. Sounds mystical but it is what it is.

David Gommé
1 July 2009
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