What is the high performance mindset
The high performance mindset is a mentality of optimising your thoughts and actions to reach your goals. It’s about using feedback to improve and being resilient when things go wrong. You’re flexible, open minded, creative and explore new possibilities. And you know that the quest for excellence always demands more from you than the mundane.
The high performance mindset is a way of understanding how you relate to the world. It’s about how you think and act, about your values and behaviour, about what makes life worth living for you. The high performance mindset is a goal-oriented mindset that aims at mastery as an end in itself, not just as a means to achieving something else.
The book High Performance Mindset by Henrik Edberg was released in Sweden in 2017 and has since then been published in five languages. The feedback is great. It’s been picked up by different media, the book has made it to several best seller lists, including those from Amazon and Google books.
What are the main characteristics of a high performance mindset?
1. Resilience
The high performance mindset is about being resilient in the face of setbacks. It’s about looking for ways to bounce back from a loss or failure quickly. And it’s about doing so with a sense of purpose. It’s about the ability to move forward despite obstacles and setbacks. It’s about not being bitter or angry after a setback, but moving on and finding new ways of making things work again.
2. Optimism
The high performance mindset is about believing that it’s possible to learn and grow and perform better tomorrow than you did today. It’s about being optimistic, and this optimism has been shown to have a significant impact on both your physical health and emotional well-being. And the more optimistic you are, the more likely you are to be healthy and happy in life.
3. Focus
The high performance mindset is about focusing on your goals relentlessly. It’s about how you view your goals, how far away you think they are from you and what actions you take to reach them. And it’s about being able to direct all your energy towards the most important things in life.
4. Mastery
The high performance mindset is about a thirst for skill mastery and the quest for excellence. It’s about the desire for constant growing, learning and doing things better than you have ever done it before. And it’s about being driven by this quest.
5. Relaxation
The high performance mindset is also about a daily effort to relax, not just physically but also mentally. For example, if you get angry, take a deep breath, take 5 minutes and let it all go. Or, if the thought of some task makes you nervous, do something else for a while. And not just add on more work by doing it later.
6. Creativity
The high performance mindset is about constantly generating new ideas and insights, of exploring new possibilities and seeing things in new ways so that you can see things through fresh eyes. It’s about having the ability to deal with your emotions in a constructive way so that you don’t let them hold you back.
How do you develop a high performance mindset?
1. Adopt the right thinking routines.
For example, think in terms of what’s best for you, not in terms of what’s worse for someone else. Think about your own potential rather than how others are better than you. And focus on how you can use your strengths and talents to achieve your goals rather than thinking about who is better than you or why things that have worked for other people don’t work for you.
2. Read the right books.
Reading the right mindset books and learning how to think in a high performance mindset is an important part of becoming high performing. Books like High Performance Mindset, Strengths Finder 2.0 and The Power of Habit are all key.
3. Start small.
Larger goals can be overwhelming, so start with something small and doable first (the small things really do add up!). Start by making an effort to think in a high performance mindset, by doing the right small things and by setting goals that are within your reach.
4. Find others who are doing it well.
Spend time with people who are already where you want to be and reach out to them for feedback, advice and mentoring. Posting thoughts on social media about high performance is another way to connect with likeminded people around the globe.
5. Avoid negative thinking routines as much as you can.
The high performance mindset is about being positive and focusing on action rather than thinking a lot about things that you can’t change. This can be hard because it’s hard to help yourself think positively when your mind starts to go negative. You need to learn how to stop that negative thinking before it starts by using techniques like reframing and affirmations, or distracting yourself by doing something positive.
6. Make your mindset visible.
An important part of the journey to a high performance mindset involves being able to see your mindset and behaviour in a new way. One way of doing that is to pick up a mirror, look in it and say ‘I’m high performing’ out loud. Or write something on a piece of paper: ‘I’m high performing’ and stick on your mirror or the piece of paper next to the phone when you get up in the morning.
