Learning to be an open minded individual can be really challenging sometimes. The reason behind this is that most people in the world are brought up with different sets of values and beliefs. Throughout our lives, we tend to surround ourselves with people who share the same beliefs and values as we do. Hence, whenever we find ourselves in situations that challenge our own beliefs, we may struggle to accept these situations even if we wish to be open-minded.
In all fairness it safe to say that people are fairly more open-minded nowadays than a while back. That being said, people will still continue to have some very strong views about certain topics; beliefs and opinions that they will hardly be swayed from regardless of any type of persuasion.
Sometimes having strong beliefs is a wonderful thing, especially if you decide to stay true to what you believe in. However, having strong beliefs doesn’t mean that you have a closed mind. An open mind tends to reap rewarding benefits every time. There’s just so much to gain with an open mind. In this article, we discuss more about the benefits of open-mindedness. We will also look at some of the tips that will help you to develop open-mindedness for your personal growth.
The 7 Benefits of Being Open-Minded
1. Dealing With Control Issues
The best way to free your mind is by letting go of the tendency to always want to take full control of your thoughts. This will enable you to open your mind and free yourself from nagging thoughts. In addition, you get to experience first hand the possibilities that come with new ideas and thoughts; you also get the opportunity to challenge the beliefs you currently have. Eventually, you’ll feel very liberated when you start to look at the world through an open mind.
2. Dealing with change
In order to get the opportunity to change the way you think and how you view the world, you need to open your mind to new ideas. This means that you should be flexible about the option of being open-minded concerning certain matters, and this doesn’t refer to totally changing your beliefs. This kind of flexibility is good for you, and it will help you to deal with situations that make you feel uncomfortable.
3. Concerning vulnerability
Vulnerability is often associated with open-mindedness. At first, most people tend to get scared when they see this world through an open mind. When you decide to have an open-minded mentality, you’re admitting that there are possibilities out there that you haven’t yet considered. You also admit that you don’t know everything, meaning that you are vulnerable to uncertainty, and this can be quite terrifying. This type of exposure is meant to inspire you to be more resilient. When you understand your flaws you will be able to fix them.
4. Making mistakes
Being open-minded means that you may encounter challenges and perhaps make some mistakes. Making mistakes may not seem like much of a benefit, but mistakes usually open your mind; they allow you to analyze your shortcomings in order to make the necessary changes. When you make mistakes, you learn from them and this allows you to understand how to handle potential mistakes you may encounter in the future. It’s a humbling experience to get back up again when you fall.
5. Strengthening your Self-consciousness
Open-mindedness provides a platform on which you can build, piling one idea on top of another. With an open mind you can learn about new things and you can use the new ideas to build on the old ideas. Everything you experience can add up, strengthening who you are and what you believe in. It’s very hard to build self-awareness without an open mind.
6. Gaining confidence
An open mind encourages one to have a strong sense of self. A person who has an open mind is never confined by their own beliefs. Such individuals are also not confined by the beliefs of others. It is for this reason that open-minded people are able to develop confidence as they learn more about the world around them. Embracing open-mindedness educates you and also helps you to grow; it strengthens your belief in yourself.
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7. Being honest
There is a certain level of honesty which is normally associated with open-mindedness. When you understand that you are not confined by beliefs, you become less terrified about admitting your shortcomings. This new confidence in admitting your flaws will create an underlying sense of honesty which will transform your character.
11 Tips for creating an Open-Minded Attitude
1. Transform your mindset
Avoid being a prisoner of your own mind or knowledge. Starting today, you need to get rid of the “Know it all” attitude. The universe and everything that’s in it is too complicated to be understood fully. Instead of trying to justify yourself all the time, free your mind from fixed judgment, fixed ideas, bias, prejudice, and suspicion.
2. Be Alert
You need to be more observant in life; make sure that you’re always on the lookout and enjoy making new discoveries. You’ll need to embrace new encounters like meeting new people, environments, businesses, processes, etc. This transformation will eventually open doors to inspiration and new discoveries.
3. Be on the lookout for new opportunities
Never give up looking for opportunities; they lie everywhere. In this world there exist limitless opportunities in every society, market, or industry. What you only need t do is to open your mind to discover them.
4. Think like a child
This doesn’t mean that you should be acting childishly, it means looking at life from their perspectives. Children tend to look at life differently than adults. To them, life doesn’t have limits, nor barriers. You need to believe that you are ever open to limitless possibilities; believe that there are no barriers that will prevent you from exploring your possibilities.
5. Be More Adventurous
You need to be more outgoing starting today. Be willing to try out new experiences and make sure to analyze the feedbacks from your new experiences.
6. Be Curious and optimistic
Whenever you open your mind and eyes to new discoveries, insights, and inspirations you’ll begin to develop serendipity. You’ll definitely make accidental discoveries from time to time so you need to be prepared.
7. Adopt a mindset of continuous improvement
Knowing that the knowledge encompassing you is never perfect, you should strive to enhance it. Never be contented with the status quo, be more creative in order to be able to spot the hidden problems as well as opportunities.
8. Be willing to hear and consider new ideas
Humans learn throughout their entire lives. As such, you need to understand that you are always a student. Therefore always be willing to listen to others and have an open mind in order to be receptive to different opinions or ideas.
9. Dealing with problems the right way
You need to learn how to handle personal as well as work-related problems. Understand that most problems are like dark boxes, they always hide exciting opportunities underneath.
10. Embracing Positivity
A positive mindset cultures open-mindedness. Develop a positive conscious state that will allow you to turn on your flashlight so that you can attain a positive mindset.
11. Dealing with failure the right way
Starting today you need to use your failures as a valuable feedback tool that helps you to discover better ways.
Common traits of open-minded people
Listed below are some of the most common traits that make open-minded people so charismatic.
- They are willing to accept:
- They are willing to embrace change:
- They have a high level of inquisitiveness:
- They are willing to try new things:
- They don’t judge:
- They are open to other’s views:
- They respect people’s differences:
- They don’t label people:
- Live in the present:
- Turn difficulties into opportunities:
For some individuals, being open-minded is easy; to them, it comes as effortlessly as breathing. However, for others, having an open mind is more of a challenge, and most of the time it is something that they have to put a lot of effort and work on to obtain. Whether you consider yourself to be an open-minded person or not, you can certainly note from the discussion above that open-mindedness offers great benefits to those who embrace it in their lives. That being said, open-mindedness is not always an easy thing to do, at times you’ll be forced to make compromises that you’ll have to struggle with. Nevertheless, all the effort you put into attaining open-mindedness and embracing new ideas will be worth it in the end. You will eventually reap the benefits that come from opening your mind.
You need to stop being narrow-minded; such individuals are never able to stretch their ideas, thoughts, or knowledge beyond their own self-constructed boundaries; boundaries that normally prevent them from noticing the varying aspects of a situation. Narrow-minded folks often view that certain situations or actions only have one outcome. They forgo all the other possibilities that could be because they simply can’t let them be.In order to stand out as a competent and compassionate individual, you need to be able to listen to other people’s views or beliefs, even if you don’t completely agree. This way you prevent close-mindedness from hindering your own personal growth from occurring.
Let open-mindedness be on the top of the list of traits and habits that you need to acquire to be a happy person.