A career without passion

...is the belief that your abilities can be improved through effort. 

And this means you can get better and hard work pays off.

• Don’t praise ability or intelligence: That promotes a fixed mindset. Compliment effort, process and choices.
• Don’t ignore outcome, tie it to effort: You can be happy about success, but attribute it to effort.
• Respond positively to failure: Failure isn’t bad, it’s a tool for improving.
• Don’t just say “Try hard.” Set goals: Blind repetition doesn’t work. 
• Practice a Growth mindset in all areas of life: There’s no area where they cannot improve with hard work.
• Share your own Growth mindset efforts: Practice it yourself and share your results.

Steve Jobs's intro sentences were so great because they clearly outlined what the product did while creating intrigue.

Rather than rambling on, he used them to perfectly convey his message as compactly as possible.

Examples of one sentence summaries of the product he was presenting: "Mac Book Air: the world's thinnest notebook", and "iPod: One thousand songs in your pocket."

Whether you're networking or presenting, it's important to realize that it should never be a one-sided conversation.

Your audience is in the room for a particular reason. It's critical to understand why they're listening to you so you can tune your presentation in a manner that makes them more receptive listeners,

It includes the ideas we have about ourselves and the world around us. 

These beliefs come from our innate dispositions, childhood experience and/or cultural/societal influence and are often entrenched.

If you believe you can’t learn new skills or change the way you work, look at the evidence that supports both your negative and positive beliefs.

This may not necessarily lead to a modification of those beliefs, but is an important start. You can use belief monitoring to keep track of your thinking.

• Passion is not acquired but is developed.
• It isn't a cakewalk.
• Passion can also make us go wandering in the wrong direction, so we have to recognize its limits.

There is a journey one has to undergo, to develop the skills, confidence and network that will allow him to experience his true calling.

A person with a fixed mindset about his passion isn't likely to explore and dive deep with curiosity and inspiration.

It's your daily actions that will change what you believe about yourself and the person you become. 

Focus on the process. Focus on showing up,  on sticking to the schedule, on “not quitting.”

Eventually, the results and the self–confidence will come anyway. 

• People believe they always had it. But a “pure” growth mindset doesn’t exist, we are a mixture of the two;
• They believe is just about praising effort. But outcomes matter and unproductive effort is never a good thing;
• They ignore the actions needed to develop this mindset.

People with a fixed mindset think intelligence, character, and creative potential are unchangeable attributes that come from birth. They also assume that success is the result of this inherent talent. They tend to avoid failure to avoid looking fallible.

People with a growth mindset do not look at failure as a reflection of their ability, but rather as a starting point for testing ideas.

Research shows that praising a child for their intelligence can be detrimental as they face obstacles differently. Instead, praise your child for their effort.

When you believe in innate ability, then you feel you have to prove yourself over and over. Any sort of difficulty creates a desire to give up to keep your "smart" persona intact.

A strategic mindset questions and refines your current approach while facing setbacks and challenges. People with a strategic mindset continuously look for a more efficient route.

We might all benefit from thinking strategically in the pursuit of our goals.

A new study found a strategic mindset may make the difference between success or failure.

We should be aware and understand our own thinking processes. Useful strategies would include tracking your progress, recognizing your flaws and the areas that need improvement, then creating steps to overcome those challenges.

“It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”

A mindset is a set of assumptions, methods, or notations that is so established that it creates a powerful incentive within you to continue to adopt or accept prior behaviours, choices, or tools.

It’s so powerful that it affects every decision-making process. It predetermines your responses and interpretations of situations.

• It ignores the market. Unless you have a trust fund waiting for you, you’ll have to feed yourself and others. 
• It will turn a passion into a job. 

1. Identify real needs in the market that are currently not being well met. 
2. Assess your strengths: Whatever is easy for you that most others have a harder time with, that’s a worthy option.
3. Match up these two in a constantly iterative process: This process takes many years if not decades.