The Way We Avoid Accountability.

Why do we hold negative beliefs about ourselves when they serve us the option to avoid growth?

They accomplish something for you - they help you.

They help you avoid trying.

"I'll never be good at science, maybe I should go down to a lower class level"

"I'm not a fast runner, maybe I shouldn't go for a run because it won't be optimal going so slow"

If you never try, there will never be proof that you can't do it.

Do we know that we are doing this to ourselves?

Sometimes negative beliefs are conscious and sometimes they are dangerously rooted and things we've internalized as our identity.

If you were never able to do something, then your lack of ability to do so is not your fault. These beliefs allow us to place the blame on things other than us.

You can be a pro at being a beginner, and this can be a dangerous spot to stall in.

Many people are pros at addition and subtraction and even multiplication in math - math beginner pros. Calculus is a thing too - but no, we can stay pros at starter stuff. It allows us to be comfortable and not having to challenge ourselves. Any subject is like a ladder, and you can climb or stop at the rung you so please. Each rung we climb, we must become a beginner again. We must go back into the discomfort of not-knowing after we just escaped it. It’s not like completely starting over - we still have all the experience before us to fall back on to make connections from. If you don’t have that, or even if you do - going up another notch on the ladder is dependent on your willingness to learn and face discomfort.

We'd like to believe that we are capable, but only if it were true right now. However we are all capable of trying, failing, and reiterating. The hardship of being a novice allows us to grow in many facets of life. When has ever thinking you can't do something helped you do it?

"You? Doing that? No way! Haha."

Remarks like that are dangerous. They could make you think, "Maybe I'm not cut out for this."

It is important not to internalize such thoughts because they could stop you from ever becoming the version of yourself that could exist because you tried. That is the price you pay for thinking you can’t, it is delayed and indescribable (because you never allowed it to exist). However, the magnitude of this consequence will be evident in one’s lack of achievement in fields they wish they could be great at - even though they could and still can.