Top 160 Carol S. Dweck Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “In a growth mindset, challenges are exciting rather than threatening. So rather than thinking, oh, I’m going to reveal my weaknesses, you say, wow, here’s a chance to grow.”

— Carol S. Dweck

Featured in: Challenges Quotes, Growth Quotes

2. “Becoming is better than being.”

— Carol S. Dweck

Featured in: Growth Quotes

3. “What did you learn today? What mistake did you make that taught you something? What did you try hard at today?”

— Carol S. Dweck

4. “This is hard. This is fun.”

— Carol S. Dweck

Featured in: Growth Quotes

5. “Teaching is a wonderful way to learn.”

— Carol S. Dweck

6. “No matter what your current ability is, effort is what ignites that ability and turns it into accomplishment.”

— Carol S. Dweck

7. “Effort is one of those things that gives meaning to life. Effort means you care about something, that something is important to you and you are willing to work for it.”

— Carol S. Dweck

8. “Picture your brain forming new connections as you meet the challenge and learn. Keep on going.”

— Carol S. Dweck

9. “Test scores and measures of achievement tell you where a student is, but they don’t tell you where a student could end up.”

— Carol S. Dweck

10. “You have to work hardest for the things you love most.”

— Carol S. Dweck

11. “What did you try hard at today?”

— Carol S. Dweck

12. “Failure is information-we label it failure, but it’s more like, ‘This didn’t work, I’m a problem solver, and I’ll try something else.’”

— Carol S. Dweck

13. “Don’t judge. Teach. It’s a learning process.”

— Carol S. Dweck

14. “What can I learn from this? What will I do next time I’m in this situation?”

— Carol S. Dweck

15. “Important achievements require a clear focus, all-out effort, and a bottomless trunk full of strategies. Plus allies in learning.”

— Carol S. Dweck

16. “The best thing parents can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning.”

— Carol S. Dweck

17. “You’re in charge of your mind. You can help it grow by using it in the right way.”

— Carol S. Dweck

18. “It is not always people who start out the smartest who end up the smartest.”

— Carol S. Dweck

19. “We like to think of our champions and idols as superheroes who were born different from us. We don’t like to think of them as relatively ordinary people who made themselves extraordinary.”

— Carol S. Dweck

20. “I don’t mind losing as long as I see improvement or I feel I’ve done as well as I possibly could.”

— Carol S. Dweck

21. “Why waste time proving over and over how great you are, when you could be getting better?”

— Carol S. Dweck

22. “Why seek out the tried and true, instead of experiences that will stretch you?”

— Carol S. Dweck

23. “True self-confidence is “the courage to be open – to welcome change and new ideas regardless of their source.”

— Carol S. Dweck

24. “For twenty years, my research has shown that the view you adopt for yourself profoundly affects the way you lead your life. It can determine whether you become the person you want to be and whether you accomplish the things you value.”

— Carol S. Dweck

25. “Skills and achievement come through commitment and effort.”

— Carol S. Dweck

26. “Wow, that’s a really good score. You must have worked really hard.”

— Carol S. Dweck

27. “It’s for you to decide whether change is right for you right now. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. But either way keep the growth mindset in your thoughts then when you bump up against obstacles you can turn to it, it will always be there for you showing you a path into the future.”

— Carol S. Dweck

28. “I derive just as much happiness from the process as from the results.”

— Carol S. Dweck

29. “Mistakes are so interesting. Here’s a wonderful mistake. Let’s see what we can learn from it.”

— Carol S. Dweck

30. “A company that cannot self-correct cannot thrive.”

— Carol S. Dweck

31. “Choosing a partner is choosing a set of problems. There are no problem-free candidates.”

— Carol S. Dweck

32. “Vowing, even intense vowing, is often useless. The next day comes and the next day goes. What works is making a vivid, concrete plan.”

— Carol S. Dweck

33. “You can always substantially change how intelligent you are.”

— Carol S. Dweck

34. “When Do You Feel Smart: When You’re Flawless or When You’re Learning?”

— Carol S. Dweck

35. “Praising children’s intelligence harms their motivation and it harms their performance.”

— Carol S. Dweck

36. “People with the growth mindset know that it takes time for potential to flower.”

— Carol S. Dweck

37. “True self-confidence is “the courage to be open – to welcome change and new ideas regardless of their source.” Real self-confidence is not reflected in a title, an expensive suit, a fancy car, or a series of acquisitions. It is reflected in your mindset: your readiness to grow.”

— Carol S. Dweck

38. “This growth mindset is based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts.”

— Carol S. Dweck

39. “This growth mindset is based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts. Although people may differ in every which way – in their initial talents and aptitudes, interests, or temperaments – everyone can change and grow through application and experience.”

— Carol S. Dweck

40. “The growth mindset allows people to value what they’re doing regardless of the outcome.”

— Carol S. Dweck

41. “The whole point of marriage is to encourage your partner’s development and have them encourage yours.”

— Carol S. Dweck

42. “People in a growth mindset don’t just seek challenge, they thrive on it. The bigger the challenge, the more they stretch. And nowhere can it be seen more clearly than in the world of sports. You can just watch people stretch and grow.”

— Carol S. Dweck

43. “The wrong kind of praise creates self-defeating behavior. The right kind motivates students to learn.”

— Carol S. Dweck

44. “Many growth-minded people didn’t even plan to go to the top. They got there as a result of doing what they love. It’s ironic: The top is where the fixed-mindset people hunger to be, but it’s where many growth-minded people arrive as a by-product of their enthusiasm for what they do.”

— Carol S. Dweck

45. “For them it’s not about immediate perfection. It’s about learning something over time: confronting a challenge and making progress.”

— Carol S. Dweck

46. “More and more research is suggesting that, far from being simply encoded in the genes, much of personality is a flexible and dynamic thing that changes over the life span and is shaped by experience.”

— Carol S. Dweck

47. “What eventually set him apart was his mindset and drive. He never stopped being the curious, tinkering boy looking for new challenges.”

— Carol S. Dweck

48. “If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning. That.”

— Carol S. Dweck

49. “When you’re lying on your deathbed, one of the cool things to say is, ‘I really explored myself.’ This sense of urgency was instilled when my mom died. If you only go through life doing stuff that’s easy, shame on you.”

— Carol S. Dweck

50. “NASA thought so. When they were soliciting applications for astronauts, they rejected people with pure histories of success and instead selected people who had had significant failures and bounced back from them.”

— Carol S. Dweck