Mastering the Mindset
Mastering the Mindset
Missed Opportunities
There are things missing in your life. Opportunities that are right in front of you yet you continue to miss them. We can get so laser focused on our goals and working towards milestones that we end up holding ourselves back. We miss opportunities for growth, to pivot, or recognition of how much progress we're making. Make sure that you don't have tunnel vision. There could be opportunities right in front of you. You really need to hear this one.
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What's up everybody, and thank you for listening to Mastering the Mindset. My name is Darius Dutch and I'm an actor, hip hop artist and fitness and life coach. I'm here to personally help you train and improve your mindset so that you can, one, become the best version of yourself mentally and, two, gain focus and motivation to be able to take action and achieve the success in life that you want and deserve. Before we get started, please like and subscribe to my channel at the end of this episode. If you liked it, please share it with a friend or a loved one or someone who will benefit from hearing this message. I'm so glad you're here and I'm ready to go on this journey with you, and that journey begins now. Alright, and welcome back to another episode. Thank you all so much for being here. If you're watching me on YouTube, I would love it if you would subscribe to my channel. Also, if you're watching me on a podcast platform, please leave me a review. That helps out a whole lot and it is greatly appreciated.
Speaker 1:Let's go ahead and get right into it. Today, let's talk about what might be missing in your life, but not just missing, but missing at the same time in plain sight. Let's talk about those blind spots that we have, that we need to become aware of, and by becoming aware of them, excuse me, it'll help you take that next step. It'll help you get further, and I've talked about one of these concepts on here before, and that is confirmation bias the idea that whatever we look for, we're going to find and that can be helpful when you're in the season where you need to be extremely focused on a goal and you put your head down and you have your blinders on and you're blocking out all the distractions and you're ready to go, you're not paying attention to what everybody else around you was doing, what they might be thinking about you, and, of course, I preach all the time on here to be focused and not pay attention to what the external world is telling you. But I do think there is a very specific part in your journey and working on yourself and towards whatever that thing you may be working towards, there's a specific point to take a moment and remove those blinders or slide them down to the side a little bit and make sure that you ain't missing other alternative solutions, other routes or paths that can be helpful, and also to be able to see more evidence that shows you that you are capable, that you're doing better than you realize. By being too overly focused, we can get to a point where we don't really enjoy the journey as much as we should, maybe even at all. We can let those blinders rob us from falling in love with the process, and I get caught up with that a lot, With my music, with this podcast, with theater, with this podcast, for example, like I've said before, I was in my comfort zone with not recording myself on camera.
Speaker 1:I had done over 200 episodes without ever being on camera and I have been ever since that moment, that moment that I made a decision that hey, I'm going to step outside my comfort zone and I'm going to do this thing. And I just jumped and it was hard. It is hard, but I'm looking back and also looking up. Looking back at how much better I got, how, just like I predicted it's cringe-worthy to me those very first videos compared to where I am now, even though I'm still not where I want to be yet and looking up, I have so much more content to post now, so many more opportunities to reach people, a lot of people on social media. All they have time for is short-form content, the content that's less than a minute, less than 30 seconds shorter. And by putting myself on camera I have way more opportunities to just make content just for that, and I'm getting really good at it. But I needed to take those blinders off to get here. At first, I was only focused on putting out episodes via whatever podcast platform you may be on. Right, I couldn't see the opportunity in front of me that, if and when I get in front of a camera, I can reach so many more people, reaching people in a way I hadn't even thought of yet, because even when I made the decision to get in front of the camera, I was only thinking about YouTube. Again, that was a blind spot and I want to share a little information.
Speaker 1:I came across a little research, and it's this article from the Harvard Medical School, and a researcher by the name of Traffton Drew conducted the study using professional radiologists and, of course, professional radiologists. They are used to looking at x-rays all day, and what Traffton Drew wanted to find out is, if he had the radiologists look at a bunch of x-rays and told them specifically to look at lungs, and he just told them to look specifically for cancer images that show cancer? Would they notice anything else on these x-rays? But he didn't tell him he was doing that and he didn't tell them. We told them to look at these images on the lungs, look for cancer. But what he didn't tell them is that on those images, there was this photo of a man in a gorilla suit a man in a gorilla suit that was placed on the image. And the crazy part about this 83% of them missed it. 83% of them missed a man in a gorilla suit.
Speaker 1:83% of professional radiologists missed a picture of a man in a gorilla suit on an image they were examining. And it ain't because they didn't see it. They saw it, but of course, they didn't notice it. Why? Because their brains had blisters on them. Their brains had this frame in which they were only looking for one particular thing and it caused them to miss something. They were looking for cancer, not looking for a man in a gorilla suit.
Speaker 1:So what does this tell us? Well, you could be looking right at a gorilla, even though you ain't looking for a gorilla, especially if you're a professional who's trying to look for certain things and you miss the dangling gorilla. You could be somebody who has it all figured out, who has their goals written down, detailed, broken them down into smaller chunks and have a plan to be taking action daily and super focused, and can still miss something that's very important, that's right under your nose. We can get so focused on something, on working on something, on accomplishing a goal, that our attention narrows, and again, this is normally a good thing. But those blinders can black out so much that we can't even see things in plain sight, like a man in a gorilla suit right in front of our eyes, and the term for this is called intentional blindness. What this basically means is that whatever we're focused on, whatever we're working on, whatever we have our mindset on, naturally it naturally filters out the world around us, so much so that it limits what we notice, not what we see, because the gorilla is there, it ain't invisible, so it's in our eyesight, we just don't notice it.
Speaker 1:And again, I have been guilty of this. We get tunnel vision and we don't even realize it. And it's a thin line, because tunnel vision is a good thing to have to black out distractions, but there's also a moment we need to shift from tunnel vision to a bird's eye view in order to see and check and make sure that we ain't missing something, because we can get caught up in only seeing what we think is possible for us. When we only focus on our current thought. It can keep us from being open to alternative paths or different people who can help us along the way.
Speaker 1:And another really important one is that we can't be keeping ourselves from having those moments that we celebrate ourselves for the progress we make and for how much growth we're having, because we get to focus on what the end goal should look like and when we have that tunnel vision, it's like nothing else matters, right? So sometimes we have to take that moment to step outside of ourselves. Look at yourself, look at your life, at the way you're approaching things. Look at it from that bird's eye view for a moment and be honest with yourself. Can you see areas where you have blind spots? I know I can. I have to keep checking myself with mine because I get so caught up in where I want my career to be my acting career, my music career, how I want this podcast to grow, my workout business. I have moments I don't have way too many moments where I get caught up in it and I get frustrated. I get down about it. I feel like it's so damn hard, like how will I ever quote unquote, get there, and every time I say this aloud to somebody, to somebody who knows all the things I've been doing, they always call me out on it and thank you.
Speaker 1:If that's one of you listening right now, because if you would have told me back before the pandemic came that, hey, guess what, in three or four years, you're gonna have a podcast, and this podcast you have you're gonna be helping people with their mindsets and the way they think, and it's gonna help them better themselves. Oh, and also, you're gonna have a workout business where you are gonna be training people in person and virtually, and each client you have they're gonna have their own webpage that you built. Oh, and you're gonna be putting out music videos. Now, I know you only have one out right now, but you're gonna do more. Oh, and people are gonna pay you to make music. Oh, and remember how you went to St Cloud State University. Well, you're gonna be going back to St Cloud, not for school, but you're gonna be getting paid to come perform for Juneteenth your music every year. Oh, and you're also gonna be really good at editing and creating your own videos. You're gonna be creating your own stuff and you're gonna get so good at it that people are gonna notice and you'll start to get paid to do that too.
Speaker 1:If you would've told me that three or four years ago, I would've been like okay, is it gonna be three of me? Right, blind spot, a blind spot. Here I am living a life I wouldn't even think was capable three or four years ago, and I'm over here, focused on these huge goals, and I get down like I'm not there yet. Right, that's a blind spot. And another thing a lot of times we can mislead ourselves, borderline lie to ourselves about what we think we're capable of. We could be doing something for the first time, going up to something we've never tried, and the whole time we keep telling ourselves I don't know what I'm doing, I'm scared, I don't know how I'm gonna ever figure this out. This is so new and we forget boy, do we forget that if you take that step back and look at it from a higher view, right, you're gonna realize you got so much evidence from the things you did in the past that you didn't know how to do back then. And look at you now on the other side of it. You did it back then, so why can't you do it right now? You can use that as confidence building.
Speaker 1:Sometimes we gotta realize that we need to look at how we approach things and the fact that what we think we're actually capable of can just be flat out wrong. Why Cause we get caught up in looking for things that support our existing beliefs. And if our existing beliefs are ones that tell us that we can't do something, that something is so hard that you don't have whatever that thing is you need, then yeah, how could you feel like you're capable, right, how could you notice that gorilla right in front of you Now? That gorilla could be the person that's always been there and said hey, if you need anything, if you ever need help, just let me know. And here you are not even accepting it because you let those blinders only allow you to focus on all the reasons why you can't, all the reasons why it ain't possible, focusing and letting your imposter syndrome hold you back, and the whole time, the gorilla, that person, is willing to help. Or maybe that alternative way of getting things done is right in front of you, the reality that you actually are doing it. You actually are making progress, just not how far along you think you should be. That gorilla could be right on the other side of that phone if you just ask for help, and the pattern just continues.
Speaker 1:But we have to be willing to look at our own blind spot. Being willing to look at the blind spots is a smart and resourceful thing to do, especially if you're a person like me who struggles to ask for help. I just do. We start thinking we Superman or Superwoman and try to do it all by ourselves and of course, it's hard goofy. Being the kind of person who looks at their own blind spots proves that you actually deserve that evolution, to evolve into a better person, a better mindset, that next level. It's so easy to get stuck in your old ways or to never look at things from another perspective.
Speaker 1:So I challenge you to really think about this concept, to look at yourself from this bird's eye view. Look and see. Is there a blind spot? Do you have a blind spot? This really could be a difference maker. It could really be that shift you need in order to get the needle moving for you. Get the needle moving forward. Look at that blind spot and prove to yourself that you're wrong, all those limiting beliefs, all those reasons you give yourself why it's so hard, why it's challenging, why you can't, why you shouldn't keep going, why you shouldn't put so much time and effort in it. What if you find out that you're wrong about all that?
Speaker 1:And that can be somewhat of a hard pill to swallow right, if we decide to look at things differently and find out that you know what I was actually wrong. It really ain't impossible. I really don't have these things working against me. I've been capable. This whole time I've been making progress. This whole time I was making progress and I stopped. I had it in me this whole time. That can be a hard pill to swallow that this whole time I've been blaming all these exterior circumstances, and actuality has been me. But the good part about that is, now that you know the root of it, you can take action. Action in the right direction, action towards that gorilla.
Speaker 1:Be willing to be wrong about what you're capable of. Be willing to be wrong about the path you're currently on being the best one, just because you did it one way for a real long time, or because somebody else told you that that was the right way it should be done. It could be the wrong path for you. It might not be aligned with the season you're in right now, and that's okay. Pivot, get curious about the alternative paths, about people and resources around you. It is possible that there can be a better way to do something. Is it possible that you ain't giving yourself the credit you actually deserve? Is it possible you're holding your own self back? Could you be missing something in plain sight? And one last thing, then I'm gonna get out of here, but be okay with your life and the path your own being different from everybody else's. Your path is your path and their path ain't yours. Continue to work on getting out of your own way.
Speaker 1:You know they say words can kill. They say they crack on the corner. I grew up like this. And if a picture is worth a thousand, they say they crack on the corner. God bless the artist. I grew up like this. Picture me perfect. They talking I'm already perfect. I do it on purpose.
Speaker 1:Yeah, call it what you want. I don't got service. She called it too much. Just see me in person, girl. Bye, I like my phone dry. I've never been thirsty. Ain't see me in a while.
Speaker 1:I'm probably working, going home from my last name trying to make it a brand name. It's died and I'm a little out. Some alone. I don't need no ashtray. I don't need no ashtray. But who am I to tell another man how to make his own money? It's getting dark out here. You don't want to walk out here. Minimum wage there ain't no job out there. No, you can stand in on a corner.
Speaker 1:Cocaine, marijuana and life is all about choices. You only get what you're born with and no two shoulders with the weight of a boulder, the crime rate boiling over. My classmates look like soldiers cuz they got them on the guns. Your life looking way different. Like you was born Glacoma, because you don't see this. Now, if the system fell in, a convicted felon or the police kill him. What you're telling? When he a kid who influenced by crack you can ask my big brother, have out that my big brother about that, and he's was my role models.
Speaker 1:And them niggas had that crack wanna smoke weed, just like them, 13 years old, like it could pass that sack, break it down, roll it off, smoke it up first time smoke it up. My father was there when, growing up, my happy home was broken up. Mama said we moving out? Yeah, she'd rather be broken. Try to be the man I hold enough. I give my pops some drops. No, he didn't do everything right. He was always in my life. We never have to worry about no lights when your best friends want to ball out like glow. Try to stay looking up. Today, roll my suit selling crack, with no problem. That's why, whenever your mama said, when that street light come on, your ex better be home cuz they say they crack on a corner. I grew up like this. They said the crack on a corner. I grew up like this yeah, they say the crack. They said the crack.
Speaker 1:He's selling crack and she using it. His family ain't cool with it. Her family got used to it. He got a bird. He flew with it. He know just what to do with it. Take it straight to the kitchen on the stove making stew with it. Ain't no money in the classroom. So we dropped out of school with it. The bad schools get the worst teachers and they don't know what to do with him. He gets labeled by society. Yeah, they call them a hooligan cuz they think we all animals and the cops are the zookeepers. I wish I could fly, cuz I would say bye. I'm going to Jupiter. I'm way too close. I got numb. I got used to it. We murdered the most. All his death, always funeral Cuz they got beef and keeping the hot like a luminum.
Speaker 1:Trying to get closer to Jesus, I want to pray in Jerusalem. I see the devil influences. I think the devil recruiting us. I'm trying to get closer to Jesus. I wouldn't bring Jerusalem. I see the devil influences. I think the devil recruiting us. I'm trying to get close. I'm trying to get close. I'm poor. Some liquor for all my dead ones. Let's make a toast out of my ice. I don't want coke. I'm trying to get through. I'm here today, but tomorrow I could be a ghost, so let's do the most.
Speaker 1:My favorite rapper talk about dope. He got them owes. Sometimes I wonder if he know, or if he don't, that the youth is who we influenced the most. Look how they boast Instagram and Facebook posts. They think is a joke. I think about.
Speaker 1:When I was a teen, 13 years old, he lived across the street. That was my dog. That was my whoa. His big brother was like my brother. He's selling dope. His brother was a hood, had a mouth full of gold. His brother got in the fight showed the hood. He ain't. No, he won that fight, get right. You better let him know. But they had a revolver and not a revolving doping. He let that revolver blow was hard to see him go. He won that fight. Me lost his life.
Speaker 1:We got the call later that night and my heart hit the flow. I was scared to go to the funeral. Mama made me go, was scared to see him cry. He couldn't keep it dry. I just wanted us to fly so they could be close to the Jesus. I want to pray in Jerusalem. I see the devil influences. I think the devil recruiting us. I'm trying to get closer to Jesus. I want to pray in Jerusalem. I see the devil influences. I think the devil recruiting us because they say the crack on the corner grew up like this they said the crack on the corner. I grew up like this yeah, they said the crack. They said the crack you.