Growth Mindset Psychology: The Science of Self-Improvement

Bad Habits: The Psychology of Behavioural Debt—and How to Pay It Off


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What if the person you think you are is an outdated idea?


In this episode, we explore how habits form—not from logic, but from history. From childhood rules to adult rituals, your behaviours aren’t just choices. They’re echoes.


We look at behavioural debt: how the past continues to extract payments from your present and what you can do about it.


We look expansively at different ways we pick up all these habits and identities, and then use 5 ideas from psychology and philosophy to fix them.

There’s a monk shedding illusions, a writer who redefined his identity, and a cycling team that changed everything with 1% improvements. These aren’t just stories. They’re invitations—to become intentional, to design rituals that serve who you want to be, not who you used to be.


Takeaways:

  • Reframe your identity as something you craft, not inherit
  • Use “identity microshifts” to pay off your behavioural debt
  • Hack your own Fresh Start Effect—even on a random Tuesday
  • Learn how to become yourself through subtraction instead of adding more things

  • If you’ve ever felt like your habits were someone else’s or like your current actions no longer serve who you are, this episode will make a lot of sense to you.


    The real work isn’t in learning more—it’s in unlearning what no longer fits.




    How to Change the World

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          Growth Mindset Psychology:

          Sam Webster explores the psychology of happiness, satisfaction, purpose, and growth through the lens of self-improvement.

          📺 Watch - YouTube (Growth Mindset)

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          Show: Growth Mindset, psychology of self-improvement


          Episode: Bad Habits: The Psychology of Behavioural Debt—and How to Pay It Off


          Chapters:

          00:00 What makes you, you?

          02:52 Memory and the self

          04:20 British Accents and lessons of children

          05:58 Attachment and behaviour

          07:58 Small Actions Compound

          09:36 Advert - Magic Mind

          09:38 Opening our minds

          11:01 Every story has a villain

          14:24 Path Dependence: The Continuity Trap

          16:21 Self Schema Theory: The Stories We Tell Ourselves

          17:52 Neuroplasticity - Hebb's Law and rewiring brain connections

          19:56 Friedrich Nietzsche and becoming who you are

          21:27 Psychological Rebirth: The Fresh Start Effect

          23:20 Conclusion - Paying of behavioural debt

          24:36 Feedback

          25:07 Send Off

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