Growth Mindset Psychology: The Science of Self-Improvement - podcast cover

Growth Mindset Psychology: The Science of Self-Improvement

Sam Webster Harris | Growth Mindset Psychologywww.growthmindsetpodcast.com
Most self-help advice is guesswork dressed up as wisdom. We dig into psychology, neuroscience, and behavioral science to find what actually changes lives. WHY LISTEN? Over 8 million downloads because we answer the questions that matter: How do I build mental strength? What creates lasting motivation? How can I understand my own mind well enough to work with it, not against it? This podcast is for curious skeptics who want frameworks backed by psychology studies, not Instagram quotes. Whether you're navigating procrastination, building self-discipline, or designing your own philosophy for a life well lived—we explore the hidden psychology behind real change. WHAT YOU'LL GET Mental models and simple techniques from cognitive psychology, positive psychology, and ancient wisdom traditions like Stoicism and Buddhism. Being a human can be confusing, learning about it doesn’t have to be. We cover everything from emotional intelligence and habit formation to brain health and the nervous system. WHAT YOU DON’T GET No pseudoscience. No oversimplified "hacks." No hustle porn. Just practical insights on mindset improvement, self-development, and human psychology that respect your intelligence and mental health. THE APPROACH Instead of telling you what to think, we explore how thinking works. Armed with psychology studies, social science research, and relentless curiosity, we uncover the mechanics of belief change, attitude change, and personal development. Success is personal. You might want to leverage your neurodiverse strengths, build a business, or simply discover how to be happier. We provide the mental frameworks to pursue your definition of success with mental strength and self-care that fits your life. YOUR HOST I'm Sam Webster Harris—a lifelong learner with ADHD and an obsession with finding answers to hard questions. After launching businesses, traveling the world, and nearly dying a few times, I concluded that psychology and science are where real wisdom lives. This show is my excuse to dive deep into health and fitness research, behavioral psychology, and cool science while helping you build genuine self-discipline and motivation. PREMIUM Go ad-free and access exclusive content, AMAs, and our community Discord. Growth Mindset Premium PAST SERIES Previous guests include Olympians, Scientists, Billionaires, and Sam's Mum. Past series: — Psychology vs Stoicism — Time Management for Busy Mortals — Independence and Knowing Yourself — Cognitive Biases and Rational Thinking — Psychology of Connection and Relationships — Carol Dweck and the Multiverse of Mindsets — Addiction and Behaviour Change — Nervous System Mastery and Polyvagal Theory — Mental Strength and Self-Discipline
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Episodes

103: Building Empathy in a Tech-Obsessed World - Kaitlin Ugolik Phillips, journalist and author

Kaitlin Ugolik PhillipsA journalist and editor who lives in Raleigh, North Carolina. Her writing on law, finance, health, and technology has appeared in the Establishment, VICE, Quartz, Institutional Investor magazine, Law360, Columbia Journalism Review, and Narratively, among others. She writes a blog and newsletter about empathy featuring reportage, essays, and interviews. In The her book, Kaitlin shares her own personal stories as well as different stories of numerous professionals about movi...

Mar 31, 202051 min

102: Teaching Kids a Growth Mindset - Maria Wilkes - Teacher and Influencer

Maria Wilkes(MA Education), researcher, teacher, tutor, writer, speaker and mentor Maria Wilkes is a language teacher at one of the top all-girl schools in London and is a private tutor. Maria left her position as a teacher and took a chance to compete in the U.K.’s countrywide competition to become the British representative at the Miss Universe pageant. She wanted to break the stereotype and offer an alternative view to those who believe that beauty pageants are degrading. Our guest is dedicat...

Mar 29, 202049 min

101: Starting from Zero - Dane Maxwell, Serial Entrepreneur, Author, Musician, Coach

Dane Maxwell Dane loves to sing, and he sings so that the world may know a deeper love of themselves and life. Dane pursued business after hurting his voice at the age of 21. Business saved Dane's life and gave him a sense of purpose and significance. He started 16 businesses and failed 11 times. Every time he failed on a venture, Dane figured out what worked and what didn't and has produced 5 successful profitable businesses:The Foundation (https://thefoundation.com/) - Specializes in training ...

Mar 24, 202048 min

100: The Best Investments Start with Yourself - Stuart Chapman, Co-Founder Draper Esprit VC

Stuart Chapman - Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder of Draper Esprit Plc Draper Esprit , a Pan-European venture capital fund that invests into disruptive tech companies at the early and growth stages Draper Esprit is one of the most active venture capital firms in Europe, developing and investing in disruptive, high growth technology companies. They believe the best entrepreneurs in Europe are capable of building the global businesses of the future. The company fuels their growth with long- ...

Mar 23, 202046 min

99: Things Don't Need to be Perfect - OddBox co-founders, Deepak Ravindran and Emilie Vanpoperinghe

Emilie Vanpoperinghe and Deepak Ravindran Emilie was previously Director of Finance & Operations for an international NGO set up by the Nike Foundation. Deepak worked for most global investment banks as Senior Consultant specialised in Global Equity Derivatives.The Oddbox story started in Portugal, at a food market filled with wonky fruit and veg. Co-founders, Deepak and Emilie, were shocked to find out that a number of produce in the UK is wasted before it even leaves the farms because of t...

Mar 19, 202041 min

98: Being the Change You Want in the World - Tom Stancliffe, CEO - TRIBE

Tom Stancliffe, Co-Founder of TRIBE, the UK’s leading natural performance nutrition brand Tom established TRIBE in 2015 following Run for Love, a 1,000 mile run across Eastern Europe to set up the first home for trafficked children in the UK. Today, TRIBE is on a mission to change the world of sports nutrition by creating the highest quality, all natural products for everyday athletes – and bringing its community together through a love of nature and outdoors, blazing a trail to connect and insp...

Mar 16, 202039 min

97: Mindset Lessons after 100 episodes of Growth

Sam looks back on what we've learnt with 100 episodes of Growth Mindset. We cover some of the things he's done from talking with hitmen to living in the woods with a bunch of hippies. Learning through peoples stories is much better than theory and we hear more of Sam's story and what he has been up to over the past three years. From being an awkward human who didn't like speaking to becoming a stand up comedian and Tedx speaker. Sam has learnt a lot and made a million mistakes in the process.Ove...

Mar 09, 202023 min

95: Coaching your Little Inner Voice - Jason Mueller, CEO LIV, Radiohost

Growing up, Jason was diagnosed with a neurodevelopmental disorder - tourette syndrome. Jason always had to inform his class about his condition to allow his peers and teachers to better understand where he is coming from. Realizing that public speaking was a strong suit of his, Jason did broadcasting as a radio dj in Minnesota. Jason got married and had a family. Understanding that he needed to provide more for his family, Jason became a salesperson, selling planners to schools that talked abou...

Feb 24, 202053 min

93: Incurable Entrepreneurs - Heather Thorkelson, Author, Explorer, Entrepreneur

Heather Thorkelson is a Canadian dual business owner living in rural Sweden. She runs a business consulting practice that helps small-to-medium business owners grow their bottom line without adding busy-work. She also runs a bespoke polar expedition company that takes discerning travelers on once-in-a-lifetime expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic. But more than anything, Heather is an incurable entrepreneur. She feels deeply that our traditional work environment (the 9-5) goes against what hu...

Feb 17, 202053 min

92: Will it Make the Boat Go Faster? - Ben Hunt-Davis, Gold Medal Olympian, Author, Entrepreneur

"An Olympic gold medal is a crazy thing to want, and a crazy thing to work towards. The odds - even if you are a world-class athlete - are stacked against you. I discovered that the only way to reach our crazy goal was with concrete, everyday habits." Ben Hunt-DavisBen Hunt-Davis MBE (Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) is a performance expert, coach, facilitator and keynote speaker. He is also Co-author of “Will It Make The Boat Go Faster?”, the story of how the Great Britain’s men’s ei...

Feb 13, 202054 min

91: Pushing the Boundaries of Machine Translation - Spence Green, CEO of Lilt A.I.

Spence Green is the co-founder and CEO at Lilt, a San Francisco-based startup that builds intelligent software to automate translation for businesses. Spence and his partner, John DeNero, started Lilt because they believed that a person’s native language shouldn’t limit their ability to learn, grow, and support themselves. Social problems such as social inequity - resources in a given society are distributed unevenly - rarely have satisfactory technical solutions. Steady advances in computationa...

Feb 10, 202045 min

90: Adversity to Advantage - Sam's Story with Petra Velzeboer

Petra Velzeboer is a therapist, facilitator and executive coach. Through depression, anxiety, alcohol dependence and suicidal thoughts she reached her rock bottom at 25 and decided she had a choice: to learn how to truly live or to end her life now. Over a decade of experimenting on strategies for success and learning everything about mindset and psychology, her life is 100% different than what it might have been! Her goal is to teach others who are near their rock bottom, to help them learn the...

Feb 05, 202059 min

89: Growing up in Wartorn Iraq to Silicon Valley Success - Francis Dinha, CEO Open VPN

"LOSERS quit when they fail and WINNERS fail 'till they succeed"Francis Dinha has been key in orchestrating growth at OpenVPN Technologies, by building a viable business model to assure the Company's continued success. OpenVPN Inc. is a privately held company based in the Pleasanton, California, integrating a suite of leading-edge networking and software technologies. OpenVPN has designed and deployed virtual private network software that provides secure, reliable, and scalable communication ser...

Feb 02, 20201 hr 5 min

87: Brain Computer Interface Development - Shifra Khan

Shifra Khan, a 16 year old BCI developer and Nanotech enthusiast, is on a mission to solve some of humanity’s biggest problems. Shifra is working on identifying huge economically incentivized problems within different industries, roles, and technologies.Being part of TKS - The Knowledge Society, a global community of the world's most curious, driven, and ambitious people that want to make an impact, Shifra honed her abilities as an innovator and an activator. Contact UsYou can find out more abou...

Jan 27, 20201 hr 16 min

86: Enjoy the Moment and Celebrate your Age

On this episode, Sam Harris talks about time because he has been thinking a lot about life and being happy as much as possible. Sam explores the things that makes people feel sad about their age and also holds back their enjoyment in the moment.After hearing complaints from friends of all ages it seems a wierd phenomonom that everyone over the age of 21 starts to panic about their birthday and in society it is rude to ask peoples age as if the fact they are old is a dirty thing. Thinking about h...

Jan 23, 202015 min

85: Ending Aging - Aubrey De Grey

Meet Aubrey De Grey – Chief Science Officer at SENS Research Foundation, VP of New Technology Discovery at AgeX Therapeutics, and editor-in-chief of Rejuvenation Research, the highest-impact peer-reviewed academic journal focused on postponing aging. He works on the development of medical innovations that can postpone all forms of age-related ill-health with an undivided focus is on rejuvenation: that is, the active repair of the various types of molecular and cellular damage which eventually ca...

Jan 20, 202047 min

84: Being a Worthy Human - Tracy Litt, Success coach

Tracy Litt, a Certified Mindset Coach, and Rapid Transformational Therapist is the author of the best seller book, Worthy Human. Tracy has much motivation and valuable insights based on her life experiences to share with her audience. Understand what helped Tracy become who she is today, and how her own decisions changed the outcome of what she faced throughout her life. Through gaining mastery over herself to become the best version of herself, learn how Tracy discovered her own importance as a...

Jan 13, 20201 hr 21 min

83: Question Everything. Let's start with Gender - Noam Kostucki

Meet Noam Kostuki – a life artist and business coach with a diverse professional portfolio, the author of “You Are Your Brand” and “Seek to Keep: How to Find the Best Mentors and Keep Them,” and also the pioneer of a jungle culinary adventure called HiR Fine Dining in Costa Rica. Having delivered two TED talks, delivered programs at Harvard and Yale, and spoken at over 80 international conferences, mostly on subjects related to “making money from doing good” and “creating masterpieces,” Noam is ...

Jan 09, 20201 hr 8 min

82: The Ultimate Answers to Everything - Noam Kostucki

Noam Kostuki is one of the most fascinating humans on the planet. He is a Ted speaker, successful author, coach and runs one of the top-rated restaurants in Costa Rica. Noam is a deep thinker and observer of life and lives for the moment whilst transcending meaningless baggage that gets in the way of the true self. An endless experimenter he has lived several lives over and enjoys reinventing himself and whatever he is doing in the name of curiosity and adventure. This is possibly the most thoug...

Dec 30, 20191 hr 11 min

78: 'Know Thyself' - Gene and Microbiome Sequencing - Sergey Musienko, CEO - Atlas Biomed

Sergey Musienko is the founder and CEO of Atlas Biomed. They provide genetic sequencing and microbiome tests to monitor your health. Sergey is a graduate of the singularity university ran by Ray Kurzweil where he first started working on the idea for Atlas Biomed. They are now one of the leading sources of data and insights into health for the curious and health-conscious human. I have used their tests myself and can highly recommend the insights and the user interface of the website is simply f...

Dec 12, 201957 min

77: The Future is What You Build - Colin Billings, CEO - Orro, First employee - Stitcher

Colin Billings is a forward-thinking human and change-maker. He first worked on Stitcher which changed the podcasting world we love today. After selling it he thought about what else he wanted to change and ended up with his home and launched "Orro" by securing investment from Yahoo CEO "Jerry Yang". "Orro" is a responsive lighting system for home automation. It adapts to your presence and your habits to bring natural lighting and mood-setting without you ever thinking about it. We discuss a lot...

Dec 09, 201956 min

76: Rethinking Education & Your Life - Grant Aldrich, CEO - OnlineDegree.com

Grant Aldrich founded OnlineDegree.com with a purpose-driven mission: make higher education more accessible and affordable for everyone. After graduating college with an overwhelming amount of debt, he was determined to change how students embark on their college education. Grant has spent his entire career working in startups with nearly 15 years of experience. He has been a board member and donor to a number of non-profits, an advisor to many publicly traded companies. Insights What stops peop...

Dec 05, 201943 min

74: Bringing People and Ideas Together - Cynthia Samanian

Meet Cynthia Samarian, a Persian entrepreneur - the Founder and CEO of an experiential event organizing agency for food companies. Find out how many times she had to switch course to find a professional career that suited her best – that, according to her, not only was she good at but also enjoyed. She has early childhood memories of having wanted to make her own money through something she made – but she never knew the answer was entrepreneurship.Insights:The importance of being happy in your j...

Nov 30, 20191 hr 9 min

73: Highly Sensitive Entrepreneurs and their Strengths - Heather Dominick

Heather Dominick is a coach of what she refers to as Highly Sensitive Entrepreneurs (HSE), interestingly; she is the only coach in this angle of life on the planet. She is the founder of the HSE program which is targeted at improving and encouraging the lives of sensitive people to go into business and actually excel. She is a survivor of the 9/11 attack.Heather is the winner of the 2015 Best of Manhattan Coaching Award and creator of the 2014 Stevie Award winning virtual event 'A Course In Busi...

Nov 27, 20191 hr 2 min

72: Lessons in Being Extraordinary - Mario Nawfal

Mario Nawfal is crazy. But also stupidly successful, intelligent and charming (...and young). At only 30 years old he has several million-dollar businesses and runs the Athena business conglomerate across 40 countries. He is also a serial investor and business coach. Mario lives a nomad lifestyle and somehow finds the time for getting serious with his hobbies. In general, he knows a lot about making the most of life and what it has to offer. We discuss how Mario made his first break and the path...

Nov 25, 20191 hr 16 min

70: Getting People to Think Your Idea is Their Idea - Oren Klaff, bestselling Author & Investor

Oren Klaff is a sales genius and investor with 2 bestselling books and a tonne of great ideas. The renowned classic, ‘Pitch Anything’ designed to help you understand how to make a compelling pitch using neuroeconomics. And now his new book, ‘Flip the Script’ which is designed to help you make people think your idea is their idea so they readily accept it. With a wealth of experience from making deals and living a fascinating life, it was an honour to chat through some of his insights. Oren neatl...

Nov 06, 20191 hr 12 min

69: The Outward Mindset - Heather Adams, The Arbinger Institute

Heather Adams is a leading partner at the Arbinger Institute who focus on the 'Outward Mindset'. They coach businesses and leaders to become more effective and more aware of themselves and to achieve greater success. The inward vs outward mindset is a fascinating topic that I wasn't 100% versed on and it was a real pleasure to receive a masterclass from Heather. In the interview, we learn more about what makes relationships work and how to view others. There are so many mistakes humans easily ma...

Oct 22, 20191 hr

68: The Mindsets for Leadership and Success - Ryan Gottfredson PhD

Ryan Gottfredson is an innovative researcher and coach in the mindsets behind success and leadership. We discuss his top findings and the key mindsets that make a good leader. The four main Mindsets discussed:Fixed vs. GrowthClosed vs. OpenPrevention vs. PromotionInward vs. OutwardWe also branch into many fascinating topics to end up with a really educational podcast to help make you a lot wiserRyanConnect on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryangottfredson/)Pre-order Ryans book and find ou...

Oct 07, 20191 hr 41 min

67: Coaching Olympic Success - Frank Dick OBE (Current coaching strategy with England Rugby team)

Frank Dick is one of the world's finest sports and motivational coaches ever. He is currently working with the England Rugby team during this year's Rugby World Cup.Frank was the England Athletics coach for three Olympics as well as coaching several high profile individuals. Some big names include Boris Becker, Seb Coe, Daley Thompson.He has also worked with the South African Olympic teams and won some prestigious titles such as the 'UK Sporting Hero' for 2001.This episode is an absolute masterc...

Sep 30, 20191 hr 16 min

66: The Ultimate Guide - Life Lessons from Great Minds

This episode is an ultimate guide to life and entrepreneurship. After two years of interviewing some of the greatest minds, Sam distils their wisdom into a 2-hour mini-audiobook.This took a long time to put together but is completely worth it. Hear the best tips from some of the most amazing individuals stitched together into a narrative that transcends each chapter. From fascinating stories of the highest moments to the lowest lows we learn a lot:What to focus on in lifeHow to turn an idea into...

Sep 22, 20191 hr 56 min
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