Reframe: How to Be Resilient in the Face of Adversity
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The reality is that it is impossible to feel happy all the time. The peaks and valleys offer a variation in our emotional landscape, a universal richness in our experience that ultimately leads us to a capacity for empathy and deeper wisdom (Rodriguez, 2013).
Being able to respond to the stimulus around us in a thoughtful and deliberate way that aligns with our values and internal wisdom comes from the understanding that we have the capacity to adapt to our environment and that we can choose to interact in an intentional way. We have the power to take what we experience and reframe our experience in such a way that it truly serves us, instead of allowing our default responses to take over. We can adopt a reframe mindset—the ability to respond in a mindful way to our circumstances. The reframe mindset concept is inspired by the concept of growth mindset, coined by Carol Dweck (2006). Growth mindset is the belief that most of our basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work. Dweck identifies two mentalities: fixed and growth mindsets that human beings adopt at an early age and that are ultimately responsible for much of our successes, failures, and happiness. When it comes to resilience and growth mindset theory, it is possible to dismiss some of the systemic processes and institutionalized mechanisms that function to prevent certain individuals (those from a certain race, social hierarchy, or sexual identity, as well as those with specific individual circuitry and brain chemistry) from overcoming adversity. As Stefanie Faye Frank, a neuroscience researcher and clinician, asserts in her interview on KindSight 101, “Growth mindset is not always readily accessible to everyone” (Michael, 2018e). Certain things can hold us back from developing a growth mindset. Frank claims this concept is overgeneralized and has morphed into a buzzword within the field of education, which results in people taking it to the extreme (Michael, 2018e). She calls this hyper belief, topdown extremism, whereby we believe so wholeheartedly in the idea of mind over matter, the notion that we can change the architecture of our brain just by willing it so, that we dismiss the reality that environment has a tremendous formative impact on brain development. The problem with top-down extremism, as Frank states in our 2018 podcast interview, is that “it is a dangerous path because it can create a sense of apathy in society” (Michael, 2018e). Moreover, in a learning culture where we often urge our students
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Growth Mindset and Reframe Mindset
