Open Your Mind!
What does it mean to open your mind?
Opening your mind gives you the power to break down your internal walls and remove any self-limitations you impose on yourself. Often, people tend to get in their way by losing belief in their abilities to chase dreams, learn new skills, and accomplish goals.
Opening your mind means you believe in all the possibilities before you. Rather than assuming a negative attitude and immediately assuming you can’t do something, you accept that life can surprise you in various ways. Instead of living in self-doubt or fear, you let yourself explore all your options, try new things, and experience everything life offers.
What are the benefits of opening your mind?
Opening your mind offers a variety of benefits. For example…
- People who open their minds have a strong sense of self-confidence.
You have a strong sense of self-confidence because you’re willing to keep an open mind. You understand yourself well and know your strengths, weaknesses, and limitations. Because you feel secure in your knowledge of yourself, you’re comfortable keeping an open mind when considering new experiences or topics.
- People who open their minds experience tons of new and exciting adventures.
With an open mind, you let yourself be exposed to the world. With this willingness and openness to experience everything the world offers, you have tons of adventures in life. Fear and uncertainty don’t hold you back – instead, you live life to the fullest because you let yourself be open to everything.
- People who open their minds are highly understanding and empathetic.
When you’re opening your mind, you learn to view the world through many different lenses and perspectives. This type of openness helps you better understand how differently all people can experience the world – because of this knowledge; you’re very understanding and empathetic toward the plights of others.
- People who open their minds are excellent problem solvers.
When you have an open mind, the world doesn’t seem as surprising. In the face of a surprise or unexpected situation, you’re more likely to approach it with a problem-solving attitude rather than one of anxiety or stress. Keeping an open mind helps you embrace new situations rather than flee from them, making you a superb problem solver.
- People who open their minds are lifelong learners.
Keeping an open mind allows you to learn new skills and information constantly. Rather than stagnating and staying the same, you’re continually trying new things and learning. Every day is a unique chance to learn something new when you open your mind.
What happens when a person struggles to open their mind?
Some people harbour a closed-minded attitude toward life. Instead of being open and receptive to new experiences, they choose to shy away from chances to try different things and potentially exit their comfort zones.
If you can’t open your mind, you immediately shutter yourself from a vast landscape of possibility and potential. Everything you find familiar and comforting was once new and unfamiliar to you. These experiences only become familiar once you allow yourself to experience and embrace them. If you decide you’ll keep a closed mind, you stop expanding your knowledge and understanding of the world.
Struggling to open your mind makes it difficult to excel in life. New experiences and unfamiliar territory are a significant part of exploring the world and growing as a person. If you struggle to open your mind, you won’t be able to move forward far in life.
What are some strategies for learning how to open your mind?
Learning how to open your mind can feel frightening at first. To make the process a little easier, consider the following strategies to get started:
- Allow yourself to consider the positive possibilities instead of only the negative ones.
Leaning toward your negative biases is a natural response unfamiliar – when you do this, it’s a deeply-rooted natural mechanism meant to steer you away from potential danger. However, this mindset prevents you from keeping an open mind.
Allow yourself to consider that keeping an open mind and trying something new could also lead to positive outcomes. Just as you can’t predict that the absolute worst thing will happen, you also can’t expect that something great won’t happen. Let yourself be open to the idea that bad things can happen, but so can good things!
- Get comfortable with making mistakes, failing, and being wrong.
Making mistakes stinks. It can feel nearly impossible to admit your fault when you make a mistake, fail, or are wrong about something. Getting comfortable with making mistakes, failing, and being wrong is a huge step toward opening your mind.
Having to admit your fault to another person puts you in a direct position to experience someone else’s perspective or opinion of a situation. While this can be challenging to experience after you were wrong about something, it puts you in a position to learn and grow from the experience.
- Try changing how you do some of your usual activities to challenge your comfort zone.
A good step toward opening your mind is exiting your comfort zone for a moment. You don’t need to make any massive, grand changes to achieve this. A simple tweak to one of your current routines or activities will do.
For example, if you usually exercise at the gym, try going on an outdoor run for your daily workout instead. If you like to eat at an Italian restaurant on Saturday nights, try the new sushi place downtown next Saturday instead.
These minor tweaks and changes introduce your mind to being open in a gentle, low-stakes way. As you increase these minor changes over time, you’ll be far more open-minded.
