How to develop a strong mindset? If you are asking this question, I can tell that you are already far stronger mentally than most people. But as usual, there is always room for improvement. Maybe you’ve recently experienced overwhelming circumstances or taken on a new challenge that requires you to step out of your comfort zone. Whatever the reason is behind why you are reading this, you should be proud of wanting to make all their positive improvement in your life.
Before we even consider how to develop a strong mindset… I guess the first question to ask is why you might want to develop a strong mindset.
A strong mindset is one of the main ingredients of success. Having a strong mindset means you can stay strong and face adversity head-on without letting challenges sweep you off your path. A strong mindset will help you to push through and get yourself out of the deepest holes in your life.
It means that no matter what will happen to you in your life you can maintain your happiness and ensure that you do not get in the way of you!
A strong mindset gets you into a winning mindset. It gives you the confidence you need to succeed.
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What makes a strong-minded person?
When you think of a strong-minded person what comes to mind?
To me, a strong-minded person is someone who has developed the capacity and capability to face and overcome challenges. Here I stress the word DEVELOPED because a strong mindset is not something you are just born with. It takes self-awareness and some work. But this only means anyone can develop a strong mindset with the right approach and some conscious effort.
Someone with a strong mindset has the mental skills and physical capabilities to respond to and overcome challenges. They are focused on GROWTH and LEARNING. They are self-aware, have clear boundaries, and never compare themselves to others.
How to develop a strong mindset: unlocking the secrets to success?
So now that we have established what we mean by a strong mindset and what defines a strong-minded person let’s get into the HOW?
There is an overwhelmingly long list of all the things that will help you build that strong mindset. Just know that you do not have to have all of them to be strong-minded and not all things may apply to you. Plus, you might surprise yourself to find that you already do a lot of these things. Take your time if you need to work through them step-by-step, one thing at a time.
In no time if you apply these principles, I am sure you will be on your way to unlocking your full potential and getting all the success you deserve in your life.
1. Get to know yourself
This one might not be obvious from the get-go. However, knowing yourself, and facing your strengths and weaknesses is vital to building a strong mindset.
When you start to look inward at yourself you can start to build self-awareness. Once you have self-awareness, you will begin to understand how you operate in the world, you will understand your thought patterns and feelings. This means you can start to build a more objective view of the world around you, who you are, and your circumstances.
This will help you build a strong mindset because you will begin to own who you are! No one else will have the power to define you! As you give yourself the chance to know yourself, you will begin to be more accepting and comfortable with who you are. This will help you navigate the world with confidence.
2. Acknowledge your emotional states as they arise
Apart from knowing yourself well and understanding your character, to have a strong mindset, it is important to own your feelings. Especially the uncomfortable ones.
There are so many people that I know who are not honest with themselves about what they feel. For whatever reason, they would rather brush their feelings under the rug, than face them head-on. The problem with mislabelling your emotions is that you do not give yourself the opportunity to process them. If you do not call your feelings out for what they truly are and what they really mean, you are not giving yourself the opportunity to move on.
They will remain hidden deep in your subconscious, bubbling away. There they will continue to show up in your lifetime and time again, building sadness, resentment, and anxiety. They feel keep on feeding more negative emotions.
When you take the brave step to label the emotions and highlight the true reasons for what you are feeling you take back control. Rather than your emotions having control over you – you CAN TAKE CONTROL OF THEM!
Acknowledge and deal with negative thoughts.
3. Get clear on your values
Having well-defined values is a vital step to living a more authentic life.
We all have values, whether we are consciously aware of them or not. They are vital because they guide our thoughts and behaviors. Therefore, they make a fundamental part of who you are.
When you begin to understand your values, you can begin to align your actions with those values.
Understanding strong values underlie the many things that allow you to develop a strong mindset. They allow you to set and assert your boundaries. They allow you to have a stronger sense of safety and stability building your confidence. Plus, they ensure you are not easily influenced by others.
Make a list of values that come to mind for example:
- Love
- Honesty
- Achievement
- Trust
- Compassion
- Empathy
- Wealth
- Loyalty
4. Get clear on your goals
Having well-defined goals forms a big part of having a strong mindset.
When you are striving for something big, when you are pursuing your dreams to get the life you want, you will at times face adversity. There will be lows, so low you might want to give up. However, when you have the clarity of what you want, and why you want it, it will help you to build that mental resilience.
Although challenges, frustrations, and failures may arise along the course, the clarity of your goals will help you to stay strong to overcome the obstacles.
5. Stay committed and follow-through
A strong mindset is not something that just happens overnight. It takes work. Understand that commitment comes from within.
A strong mindset begins to form when we overcome challenges, stay committed and follow through on goals.
When you start to build a resume of all the times you have overcome difficulties in life, it will begin to form part of your identity.
You are someone who can handle challenges! You are someone who can stay committed and follow through on your dreams.
So, begin by taking a piece of paper and writing down all the times in your life that you have faced challenges and you dealt with them or overcame them.
You survived each and everyone because you are here today.
If you do not have that experience to draw from, make a list of all the small challenges you could face and get through those. Start small and build up that evidence and with time you can increase the magnitude of the challenges.
6. Avoid shiny object syndrome (follow your path)
We have all fallen guilty of the shiny object syndrome or of thinking that the grass is greener on the other side.
It takes some serious mind power and self-awareness to not give into this.
What do we mean by shiny object syndrome?
Essentially it happens when people focus their attention on something which is new and trendy but drops it as soon as something newer or “better” comes along.
It means becoming easily distracted, changing direction too often, and not following through on goals. It means not staying on your unique path because everyone else is choosing a different path.
These are some reasons why shiny object syndrome can keep you away from your goals. And why overcoming this inkling feeling to jump into something new is important for a strong mindset.
7. Practice gratitude
“Gratitude is like a magnet; the more grateful you are, the more you will receive to be grateful for.” Iyanla Vanzant
One of the most powerful ways to rewire your brain for more joy and less stress is to focus on gratitude. When you develop an attitude of gratitude you will begin to appreciate all you have in your life.
You will see how much you have to appreciate rather than what is missing. This will allow you to feel happier as you begin to see life as a glass half full rather than a glass half empty way.
This will lead you to feel more positive about your life instead of being filled with constant worry, stress, and frustration. You will be able to focus on all you want to achieve rather than wasting energy on worrisome thoughts.
8. Find ways to quiet your mind
The ability to control your emotions and reactions to everyday events is vital to a strong mindset. When you can master keeping your internal environment calm, even when hell breaks loose around you, you will become unstoppable.
I bet you can think of an instance when someone said something or did something that really triggered you. It could have been small or big. How long did you ruminate on it? How much time did you spend thinking about it? And how much energy did it consume?
Finding ways to quiet your mind is a great way of developing a strong mindset – because it allows you to be less reactive. Therefore, you are clearing up time and energy, and focus which you can divert to things that matter to you.
My favorite way is through meditation, but it could also be through exercising, reading, going for a walk, or simply doing some deep breathing.
9. Think in terms of abundance, not scarcity
When your mind is consumed with thoughts of what is scarce in your life, you will create a lot of fear and anxiety. When you are in a scarcity mindset you will feel as if there are limited resources for you to get everything you want.
You may be inclined to start comparing yourself to other people. It could also lead you to get easily discouraged when things take the time or results are not obvious.
Shifting to an abundance mindset will help you build a foundation for a strong mindset. You will feel empowered to strive for your goals because you know that anything you set your mind to, is very much achievable.
Rather than thinking oh but they’ve already done it so there is no point, you will think, they have done it so I must be able to as well.
10. Set clear boundaries
Setting clear boundaries is crucial for you to feel safe in your relationships and in the world. Compromising your boundaries can lead to feelings of sadness, resentment, anger, frustration, and low self-esteem. Without clear boundaries, your confidence is likely to plummet.
Learning how to assert your boundaries will help you develop a strong mindset because you will be protecting yourself from people who drain your energy. Also, let us face it feels good to say NO!
When you set boundaries you feel like a Boss of your life – that’s empowering.
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11. Stop with the comparison game
Strong-minded people have this amazing ability to stay focused on their life and block out any noise coming in from their surroundings. This means they have a clear pathway toward living their best life. They block out distractions, negative feedback, and other people’s chatter.
By avoiding the comparison game you can achieve a strong mindset. Rather than focusing on other people’s lives, you can divert all your, energy and attention back to your life. You are less likely to experience the negative feelings that arise when you compare yourself to someone who might be ahead of you.
You might acknowledge where they are but you will not allow that to keep you from your own path.
Stop focusing on other people because you might be comparing your chapter 1 to their chapter 10. Everyone is on their own path and everyone will have their moment to shine when the time is right.
12. Stop listening to haters
One key competency of having a strong mindset is being ok with people having an opinion about you or what you are doing, even if it is negative.
The thing is whatever you do in life someone will have an opinion – someone will critique what you are doing, and who you are. But for every person that does there will be plenty of raving fans that adore you!
In many cases, the nay-sayers are projecting their own insecurities or personal struggles into the world. A lot of time, deep down it has nothing to do with you and everything to do with them.
Remind yourself that whenever you encounter them and you’ll be way on your way to building resilience.
13. Never pass an opportunity to learn
If you want to develop that strong mindset, ensure that you grab and hold onto every opportunity to learn. Anything which will help you grow personally or grow your knowledge or skills is worth having.
You never know but what you learn could be the key to everything down the line. It could be the thing that will help you grow into an even better version of yourself. It could be the things that show you just how strong you are.
Yes, it takes effort and at times it can be uncomfortable, but it could help everything fall into place.
14. Make time for self-reflection
Mentally strong people make it a habit to check in with themselves and readjust continually.
Sometimes when we are not living consciously it is easy to fall into living on autopilot. The dangers of that are that you are not even aware when you are straying off the path. Whether, emotionally, mentally, physically, or any other way and in any area of your life.
You may accumulate habits or negative thought patterns that negatively impact your life – when you realize, you’re so far gone it will take serious effort to unlearn everything and get back on track.
On the other hand, when you make reflection part of your routine, you are giving yourself a moment to ensure that things align.
15. Do more of what brings you joy
Mentally strong people also have bad days, they also experience negative emotions and they also have challenges that they have to deal with.
They are not just robots capable of deflecting everything bad that comes their way.
Instead, they find ways to balance the bad times with the good times.
So invest some time into finding out what brings you joy in life. What do you do that makes you most happy. Or who are the people you are the happiest with? Make room for more of that especially when things get tough. It will remind you of the positives in life.
16. Embrace the difficult times
Mentally strong people do not hide from challenges, they face them head-on. So next time things are closing in on you don’t panic and don’t run.
Face the situation! Believe that you can do it or believe that you can fix it.
Waiting for things to pass themselves will not help you feel empowered. Taking control of the situation will.
17. Focus on progress rather than perfection
We all like to do things to the best of our ability but when we focus on perfecting everything we do in life we suck a lot of joy out of things.
Strong-minded people are able to enjoy the small wins rather than simply focusing on the end goals. Being able to accept that perfection does not exist helps to build mental resilience. When your default setting is to always get everything right and perfect you will spend a lot of time in your life feeling disappointed.
Because perfection is not achievable in everything that you do.
You will end up feeling bad about yourself a lot of the time if you set the bar that high.
That’s not to say you cannot be ambitious and put 100% into things you do when you can. But don’t beat yourself up if you fall short. Moving forward in the right direction, however bumpy or imperfect is still progress. And that is a lot to be celebrating.
On A Final Note…
There you have it – all the tips and tricks of strong-minded people that will help you build the necessary mental resilience.
Just remember that a strong mindset does not happen overnight. It will take time to develop as you test and readjust. But be kind and patient with yourself in the process.
You will absolutely get there!