Introduction
Hey folks!
It’s been a while, and a lot has changed!
The last time I wrote a blog, I wasn’t a very confident person. I couldn’t understand why nothing was going my way and I began blaming my luck.
I later came across this theory called Locus of Control which gave me a ton of insight into this personality trait of mine.
Locus of control - What is it?
Locus of control essentially refers to the degree to which people feel that they have control over various events in their life.
It’s all about belief. We either believe that we are the reason for our success and failures or we blame external forces such as luck, God, Universe, and so on.
Our anticipation of these assumptions has a huge impact on the way we behave. We are either less driven to pursue something or more driven.
I came across a paper published in 1998 by Claudia M. Mueller and Carol S. Dweck.
Let me summarize it quickly.
Essentially, a teacher gave puzzles of three different levels of difficulty to some fifth graders.
Regardless of how the kids performed, they were all graded very high and praised for solving the puzzle.
Here’s the interesting part - the teacher complimented half of the kids and told them that they did well because they were born smart and the other half was told that they did well because they worked hard.
Now, the kids who were told that they were smart focused on solving the easier puzzles and didn’t push themselves to try to solve the harder ones.
They rated the overall experience very bad and didn’t really enjoy it.
This is because they began believing it was easy because they were smart, and they couldn’t control them being smart, right?
This is what we refer to as an external locus of control.
On the other hand, the kids who were told that they worked hard, focused on solving the harder puzzles.
They rated the overall experience very entertaining and enjoyed it.
This is because they believed that they worked hard and that’s why they solved the puzzle, they controlled their outcome.
This is what we refer to an internal locus of control.
Now, let’s talk about my own experience.
I used to believe that I wasn’t able to perform well in certain events because of “bad luck” - this had a very bad effect on my drive to perform better, because after all, it wasn’t my fault, right? This is a classic example of an external locus of control.
The day I began taking responsibility for my actions, the outcome of different events drastically changed. This refers to an internal locus of control.
External v/s Internal Locus of Control
People who have a strong internal locus of control tend to take responsibility for their actions. It’s interesting to note that these people tend to be more independent as well.
When we compare this with people who have a strong external locus of control, they tend to make excuses and blame other circumstances for their failure.
Now, this raises the question - “How does one bring about a change in their locus of control?”
It’s simple! You just gotta learn to take responsibility for your actions! It’s good to have faith in supernatural powers, but not good to trust in them completely.
If you’re not doing well in a particular task, it is because you are most likely doing something wrong. Let’s discuss an example to support this statement.
Let’s say, your chemistry exam went bad because your pen stopped working. Isn’t it your fault that you didn’t check before the exam? There’s no point blaming the universe for your bad luck.
Luck as a concept is quite skewed to me.
Good things happen to people because they make it happen, aka, they manifest it!
Bad things happen to people because they didn’t care enough!
What can I do now?
If you feel personally attacked by this article, don’t worry I know exactly what you gotta do.
Start working on solving smaller tasks - make your bed, finish your assignments way before the deadline, and maybe even cook your own meal!
Once you’re done with your task, I want you to take a minute to appreciate what you’ve done and acknowledge that YOU did the task all on your own.
Why?
The idea here is to help you build a strong internal locus of control. Once you begin accepting that things happen because YOU make it happen, your confidence will skyrocket.
You won’t spend time worrying about the outcome, rather you’ll spend more time polishing your skills and effort to control the outcome. Oh, as an added bonus, you’ll begin enjoying whatever it is that you wanted to do :)
As a side note, remember rejections will always come your way. It doesn’t mean you should stop believing in yourself. There are so many instances where people persisted and ended up being extremely successful.
A classic example is JK Rowling and her famous work - Harry Potter.
Conclusion
Remember, you are your own master. You’ve always been, don’t let anyone strip you of the one thing you’ve always controlled.
A few rejections will never define who you are, own them and march on soldier!