Discover how changing your self-talk from “should” to “could” can improve mindset and confidence, overcome perfectionism, and encourage growth in life and investing.
Why Mindset and Confidence Come Easily at Work but Not Everywhere Else
Many, but not all, of my readers are physicians. You’ve trained for years to become an expert and now care for patients in varying degrees of distress. Even when the situation is new, you feel deeply confident in your skills, training, and ability to navigate unfamiliar clinical scenarios.
What if we applied the same mindset to other areas of our lives? Learning a new skill? Parenting? Being a more present spouse? Managing our investments?
Here’s what I notice: many of us struggle to fully engage and be heartfelt in new ventures. While we are experts in our respective fields, if we can’t bring that level of expertise to something new, we fail to get started. The perfection we bring to medicine can become crippling when we apply it to every aspect of our lives.
How Perfectionism Undermines Mindset and Confidence
For years, I’ve wanted to learn woodworking. But I put it off again and again. I wanted to be really, really good at it before I even started. I didn’t recognize that it’s okay — even fun — to be a beginner. To struggle, to figure things out, to not be perfect.
My internal voice was full of shoulds: “The project should turn out perfectly.” “This should be easy once I learn it.” “There should be one right way to do this.” These shoulds created pressure, narrowed my thinking, and ultimately kept me from starting at all.
I’ve been reading Magic Words by Jonah Berger, where he argues that language matters tremendously — particularly the language we use with ourselves. When we frame problems and possibilities in terms of “should,” we create rigid expectations and set ourselves up for disappointment. Should implies obligation, correctness, and a single acceptable outcome.
Building Mindset and Confidence Through a Beginner’s Mindset
But over the last few months, I finally signed up for woodworking classes. I crafted a beautiful laminated cutting board for our overlanding truck. More importantly, I noticed how engaged and how much fun I had learning while being covered in sawdust. What changed? I started asking myself different questions.
The Freedom of Could: A Powerful Mindset and Confidence Shift
Berger suggests replacing “should” with “could.” This simple shift opens up entirely different possibilities.
Instead of “This should be easy,” try “What could I learn from this challenge?”
Instead of “I should be good at this by now,” try “What could happen if I approach this with a beginner’s mind?”
Instead of “There should be one right answer,” try “What could work here?”
Do you sense the shift? Doesn’t this feel so much lighter? With “could,” you approach problems with curiosity rather than judgment. You get broader exposure to potential outcomes and solutions. You give yourself permission to experiment, to learn, to grow.
Applying Mindset and Confidence to Your Financial Life
This same pattern appears in how we think about money and investing. I hear it constantly:
“I should know how to do this myself.” “My portfolio should be performing better.” “I should have started saving earlier.”
These shoulds create shame, anxiety, and paralysis. They keep you from asking for help, from making the incremental improvements that actually matter, from starting even when you’re not perfect.
What if, instead, you asked, “What could I learn about investing?” “What could improve if I worked with an advisor?” “What could my financial life look like if I started saving $1000 more this month?”
The language shift isn’t just semantic. It changes your relationship with learning, with mistakes, with the messy process of getting better at something new.
Growing Your Mindset and Confidence by Embracing Beginner Status
As physicians, you’ve already proven you can master complex, high-stakes fields. You know how to learn. You know how to handle uncertainty. But somewhere along the way, many of us forgot that expertise is built through repeated exposure to being a beginner.
What area of your life have you been avoiding because you can’t start as an expert? What would it feel like to replace your shoulds with coulds?
The confidence you bring to clinical medicine can absolutely transfer to other domains — not as instant expertise, but as the willingness to engage fully, learn actively, and enjoy the process of becoming competent at something new.
That beginner’s mind isn’t a weakness. It’s where all growth starts.
What I’m Reading
Magic Words: What to Say to Get Your Way by Jonah Berger. The book explores how subtle language changes can dramatically shift outcomes in negotiations, relationships, and even how we talk to ourselves.
What I’m Working On
Building a new bookshelf for my home office. It won’t be perfect, but it will be mine. And I’m having fun figuring it out as I go.
