Mental Muscle Memory

Parenting makes you think a lot about your outlook on the world, especially as your kids some to you with things they hear from their friends that may not be quite right (e.g. "Calories are bad" vs. "Too little or too many calories is bad for your body").

As I think about the things I hope my kids have in their "mental muscle memory", right at the fingertips of any situation, I keep coming back to Agency, Curiosity, Optimism, and Practice.

Agency: the belief that your choices matter. It's not that you can overcome any obstacle like the magical main character in a YA book - it's just that we always have choices, and should take ownership of them to steer our own life to the extent we can.

Curiosity: having the itch to inspect something and learn about it is a valuable skill. Lifetime learning is good for the brain, and good for success in the modern world. Every single industry and part of life is changing rapidly with technology (it's cliche, but think about how many 1000s of years of human existence occured with essentially no change). Responding to the world with curiosity is key for developing skills, developing tastes, and staying in front of the steamroller of change.

Optimism: A positive outlook is good for motivating yourself, and aligning a team to execute alongside you. Too much optimism is a risk, but I'm more worried about too little. This goes hand in hand with agency to me - it's about meeting what the world throws at you with the best attitude you can. Worry and anxiety (and negative feelings) happen, but are not helpful. The faster you can set them aside, the faster you can fix your problems and reorient yourself and your team.

Effort: effective practice is the key to learning everything. You can get better at anything if you put in the right kind of work (and can do it really fast with the right kind of teacher or feedback).

I think someone that is biased towards responding to life's challenges with Agency, Curiosity, Optimism, and Effort is primed to do they best they can with the tools they are given and the direction they choose to set for themselves.