High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 637: Choosing a Good Attitude

Episode Date: August 19, 2024

In this episode, Dr. Kamphoff shares why it is important to remember we have a negativity bias. Still, we can counteract that negativity by choosing not to believe everything we think. Instead, we can remember to see the opportunity in every difficulty.   This week’s Power Phrase:  “I choose a good attitude regardless of what I cannot control. I talk to myself not listen.”

Hi, friends. My name is Dr. Sindra Kampoff, a national leader in the field of sport and performance psychology. Every week, I'm on the local radio sharing my top tips on exactly how to develop the mindset of the world's best so you can accomplish all your dreams. Get ready for a jammed, packed episode focused on practical tips to help you get after your goals and step out of your comfort zone. Let's go. Time to check in with Cinder Campoff. And today our topic is how to choose a good attitude. Now, Cinder, what do you mean by attitude? Well, what I really mean is an attitude is how we respond to events in our life. And even though it doesn't always seem like it, we actually get to choose the way we respond to events in our life. And that actually

impacts the outcome. So in other words, our attitude and our attention, like what we focus on, drives our actions. And so as you're listening today, I'm just going to encourage everyone just to think about, you know, do you choose more of a negative or positive attitude? You know, is it more uplifting and supportive? And just to reflect on that as we get going here. All right. So what is important for us to remember about our attitudes? Well, I think one thing that's really important, Lisa, is that we have a negativity bias. What that means is negative events and experiences that get stored more quickly into our memory. And for positive events, usually we need to hold them

into our awareness for at least 12 seconds or more, right? So they transfer from our short-term to our long-term memory. So not only do negative events and experiences kind of imprint more quickly, they linger longer than positive ones. And this is important as we're just trying to think about our own, you know, having a good attitude, just knowing that we're more likely to, you know, think of those negative events, and they're more likely to store quickly and longer longer just so that we know that's our default. That's important to recognize. Well, Sandra, if we have negativity, how do you suggest that we address it? Well, I think first is understanding that negativity is our default. It can help us.

And it shows you that, you know, you really, you must train your mind and work to have a good attitude to counteract that negativity. And then I just, I think the second thing is just to remember that you do have a choice to see, you know, how you see the negativity. And remember, you just don't need to believe everything you think. Much of what we think is false anyway, and we could talk to ourselves more powerfully than just listening to that negativity. And that can have a, help us have just a better attitude. Is there some kind of a specific strategy that negativity. And that can help us have just a better attitude. Is there some kind of a specific strategy that you could give us to help improve our attitudes? Sure. You know, one of my favorite strategies from my book, Beyond Grit, is called the three op.

And what that strategy is, is just when you are presented with any kind of difficulty or something that's stressing you out, just identify three opportunities. So, for example, maybe it's an opportunity to spend more time with your family or improve your business or your sport or keep growing your learning. And we know optimists, you know, people who are looking for the opportunity, they actually live longer, they have less stress, they're more resilient, and it just takes practice for us to be an optimist. Can you give us an example of that? Sure. You know, there was kind of brainstorming. I was thinking about a couple of things that have been frustrating me.

This is an example of how I use OPP. So last week I was traveling to speak to a college football team. It was so fun. But my my flight was delayed. And I think it until 3am. And I had to present at the next morning at 8am. You know, so just got a couple hours of sleep. And I was like, Alright, well, what's the opportunity here? Because I can't control, you know, the flight schedule. And it was an opportunity while I could I could get extra sleep on the plane. It would give me an opportunity to be resilient, to practice what I preach. You know, so those are some examples. Another example of something that's frustrating me right now is I just finished a new book on confidence, which I'm really excited about, but I haven't decided a publisher, right? It's a little bit more delayed than I'd like.

And so, you know, an opportunity for me to, again, practice what I preach and be resilient to find the right publisher. So those are just a few things that are frustrating me in my life right now. And just examples of how I work to see the good or the opportunity, too. Can you think of any other ways you can apply it, Lisa? Oh, yeah. Actually, on last Friday, I was just about ready to leave work. And then bing, my email goes off and there's some more work for me to do. And I was like, seriously? But I could have left it until Monday. But my thought was like, if I leave it till Monday, I know that I'm going to be thinking about it all weekend long. Like when I get back,

I have to do it. So I just took care of it. I mean, I took the opportunity to just take care of it so I could have a more relaxed weekend. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good example of, you know, something that you can't control, but you can still choose your attitude around it and decide how you want to respond. Right. So how would you summarize today for us? I would summarize and just say there's so many things outside of our control that impact us and it's important to remember that we do have a negativity bias so we can counteract that negativity bias by not believing everything we think and by looking for the opportunity and talking to ourselves you know powerfully even when things are difficult. Now leave us with a power

phrase, Cindra. I like this one. I choose a good attitude regardless of what I cannot control. And I talk to myself powerfully. Alright. If people want to read some of the books that you've written or follow along with your podcasts, where can we go? You can head over to Dr. Sindra. So D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A

dot com. And my books Beyond Grit and Beyond Grit for Business are over there as well as our speaking and our their coaching way to go for finishing another episode of the high performance mindset i'm giving you a virtual fist pump holy cow did that go by way too fast for anyone else if you want more remember to subscribe and you can head over to dr cindra for show notes and join my exclusive community for high performers where you get access to videos about mindset each week. So again, you can add over to Dr. Sindhra. That's D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A.com. See you next week.