Cultivating a growth mindset in your creative practice: Yes, there’s always more to learn

At my kids’ school, they talk a lot about having a growth mindset. And what is a growth mindset, you ask? A growth mindset is an intentional mindset or mental posture with which to approach a challenge or difficulty.

Let me set the scene: ahead, down the road, you see a big, steep, craggy mountain. And for whatever reason, you need to climb it. Maybe you’ve heard the gnomes on the mountain mine some really pretty spectacular rubies with magical properties, and who isn’t a sucker for jewellery which is sparkly but also enchanted? Or there’s a chocolate river on the mountain, and chocolate rivers are very much your tipple, but there isn’t one on your usual hiking trails or anywhere else for that matter, apart from Willy Wonka’s factory, and you don’t have a Golden Ticket so that’s a non-starter, but even if you did, Oompa Loompas are frankly terrifying. Or maybe, there’s a hermit on the summit, and you have to get them a message. The fate of the world depends on the hermit receiving this message, but her phone fell into the chocolate river and she struggles to email without help, but because she’s a hermit who lives alone she doesn’t actually have any grandchildren to provide tech support. The point is, the message really needs to be delivered by hand. And you really need to get to the top of that mountain.

But there’s a problem. You’ve never climbed a mountain before. Or maybe you’ve tried, and it didn’t work out. You fell down and broke your crown. And this mountain? This mountain is quite the mountain. Way outside the realms of what you know you can do.

It would be easy to assume you can’t climb that mountain, and leave it at that. Fair enough. But that would be the very opposite of a growth mindset. And if that’s how you play it, you will never get your hands on those rubies which confer the power of invisibility. And just think of everything you could do with the power of invisibility.

On the other hand, approaching the mountain with a growth mindset might mean reminding yourself of the following things:

You can do hard things.

You can do scary things.

You can do things you’ve never done before.

Though you now lack certain skills, they can be acquired. 

And if it doesn’t work out, and the Gnome King bars you from the mine or the chocolate river is all dried up or the hermit doesn’t feel like visitors today thank you very much, then that’s ok. You’ll try to find a work around.

I love that my kids are learning these kinds of values at school. But I’m sorry to admit I have not always cultivated a growth mindset in my own work as a writer. I’ve been at it for a while, you see. I’ve put in the hours, and done some study, and had come to the conclusion that the skills I lacked, I would lack forever. And while there were some things I excelled at, and others I could manage with effort and some angst, there were certain writerly skills I would never be able to master, because they just weren’t in my writing DNA.   

I’ll give you example: I am not a natural born plotter. My past efforts at novel writing didn’t come to much. Far too many moving parts to keep it all ordered in my head. And while I love writing emotion, gorgeous textural detail and small significant moments of transformation (great for writing picture books), I had come to believe that plotting a novel was simply beyond my ken.

But then something happened. I sold three picture books, and somehow, this little piece of success gave me the confidence to assume a growth mindset vis a vis this plotting business. Novels meant a lot to me, and I’ve always wanted to write one. Yes, plotting was not in my natural wheelhouse, but surely I could learn? The world was full of resources specifically intended to teach this very skill, was it not?

So I went about tracking down the resources (**see below for details of those I found helpful). I devoted myself to learning the skill of plotting. And it’s probably no surprise what happened next. I learned how to plot. I now know that writing a novel is not beyond my ken, because I am writing one. My middle grade dystopia is coming along. Some days I think it’s pretty good. And I’ve even started plotting books two and three and am shooting for a trilogy.  

So, that’s me, cultivating a growth mindset in my writing. It’s been helpful. Next up in my growth mindset adventures, I will be working on consistant writerly productivity, an area at which I do not naturally excel. And I guess I just wanted to encourage you, dear fellow traveller, that you can acquire new skills in your creative practice too. Even if something feels hard. Even if you’ve tried before and failed. Not being able to do something now, doesn’t mean you’ll never be able to do it. Find a good book or online course. Get to work. Practice, practice. And who knows? That growth mindset might bear some really beautiful fruit.

**These are the resources that taught me how to plot. I enthusiastically commend them to you:

‘Outlining your Novel: Map Your Way to Success’ by K.M. Weiland. This book took this incompetent plotter by the hand and gently led me through the process of plotting a novel. Now I know how to plot. Honestly life changing for this writer.

The Australian Writing Centre runs all manner of fabulous courses, and Plotting and Planning with Kate Forsyth was tremendously helpful in my growth mindset journey.