What's Stopping You?: Why Smart People Don't Always Reach Their Potential, and How You Can

Reframing Failure

Yet this is easier said than done, in my view. Hardwired or default settings mean that any newly-imposed thoughts or beliefs will feel like they are going against the grain, which will result in setbacks or failures being judged as confirmations that the original settings were the correct ones. That monkey won’t shift so easily, I’m afraid.

But I may be taking Caunt too literally. What if we tried to reframe negative influences, not to change our inner beliefs or default settings but in order to soften or even alter their impact? We will look at reframing the negative assumptions that underline low self-esteem in Part Four but what about failure? Can we reframe our view of failure – perhaps even rethinking failure as something ...