Yes I Can Use the positive power of selfefficacy

[Music]

alright

[Music]

foreign

i’m laura ritchie that was part of a

piece called

resonance written for me as a soloist by

the composer

jill jarman i started to study the cello

seriously

the summer before i was 18 and i knew

i had a long way to go about 10

000 hours of practice but i was full of

wild ambition

and i felt nothing was impossible

i remember in one of my early cello

lessons

my teacher looked straight at me

and being realistic he said you’ll never

be a soloist i felt

angry and i fought hard not to cry

but inside i felt determined

and i thought yes

i can

i can and i did

that wasn’t the first or last time i

heard

can’t or won’t there’s a lot of

no in the world no

is one of the top 100 most frequently

used words

where yes doesn’t make an appearance

until nearly 200 places down the list

i did learn and i rose above

the nose despite his realism

my teacher saw the spark of yes in me

and he watered it like a seed i’ve never

stopped growing

self-efficacy what gives that sense of

yes you can do something and

agency is when you go and do it

i’ve spent my academic career

researching how we cultivate

and act on our yes

understanding the psychology of

self-efficacy

is key to unlocking your personal agency

in the late 1970s albert bandra

initially defined self-efficacy as a

personal belief

in our capabilities to do a certain task

it gives our sense of yes of can

of drive towards agency it’s a good

thing

but all around us society tells us what

we can

or can’t do bombarding us with messages

that echo in our

personal bubbles and it’s up to us

to somehow make sense of it all

and manage our beliefs

we have to ask ourselves what do we

believe

are we tricked into giving up our agency

has the way we view ourselves and our

capabilities

changed or do we take a view at all

i think sometimes we’re taken for a ride

in life it’s like being on a tourist bus

or sitting in the boat on the

it’s a small world ride at disney you

know the one

everyone loves that happy songs you

gently float along the river

while mechanical dolls go by singing and

dancing representing lots of countries

as you sit in the boat and float through

displays from around the world

you see so much

but when you leave instead of having

learned about those cultures

gained some wisdom through the

experience

most people walk away with little more

than

a memory of a famous tune

just because you’ve been on the ride

gone through the motions

doesn’t mean you’ve learned anything

it happens in education as a teacher

i can coach you through writing an essay

or studying for a test i can

tell you just what to do to get the

right sounds out of the cello

unless you’re aware of the process

you’re just like a mechanical doll

owning the process makes all the

difference

after doing something could be passing a

test

baking a cake writing a song any task

it’s easy to be swept up in the magic of

wow i did it

but that frozen

insta moment gives us

a false sense of accomplishment

and we need to wake up from that fancy

photo world

where society tempts us to show we’re

prose

even though we’ve only just had a taste

developing complex skills like learning

a trade

becoming an expert takes

time it would be like saying once you’ve

made a

cake out of a packet mix that somehow

you’re a chef

whatever your goal whether playing the

cello

cooking designing a house making an app

becoming a civic leader

these take years to master however

they are not only for a select few

and out of reach for others

nobody can tell you what you can

or can’t do only you

can decide whether you believe in your

capabilities

only you can have self-efficacy

to do things people with self-efficacy

are far more likely to be resilient

persist in what they do and get results

research has shown that developing

expertise takes

thousands of hours and seeing the road

from that first note to becoming your

own soloist

understanding the progression knowing

how to navigate getting from here to

there

does take years of dedication

self-efficacy may be a long-term

superpower but it doesn’t make you a

quick fix

superhero and you’re not going to leap

the mountain of your dreams in a single

bound

we start with an individual task

and it’s processes there are

notes to learn fingers to toughen up

with calluses

muscles to train a whole palette of

skills to develop

no matter what you’re doing

when we consciously think

about thinking and learning processes

that’s called metacognition

understanding what’s required

knowing you have the skills realizing

how you feel and do being

aware and owning your self-efficacy

suddenly makes things seem possible

this is the key to unlocking agency

but modern life has been constructed for

ease and people don’t need

to learn things we’ve made huge advances

to automate

and simplify creating space

and time where years ago

we would have had to work

to figure out things and now

there are gadgets to do things for us

heck i can turn on the hot water

with an app

actually with most things in my house

i neither need to lift a finger

nor know how anything works to be

perfectly comfortable the very nature of

automatic means it’s done for

us when things are done

for us where’s our agency

it’s not enough to simply

have self-efficacy beliefs

it’s really important to know what we’re

believing in

what a task involves to have

accurate self-efficacy beliefs

i studied 600 school children in england

who were beginning to learn musical

instruments and

i asked one boy who was cheerful and

confident

what he was learning and he said

the elbow

he really didn’t understand but he made

sense of the situation by using the word

that

sounded closest to his actual instrument

the oboe

what are the component parts

the skills the processes

how do we get from a to b

there’s a big difference between an oboe

and

an elbow self-efficacy

has to be something people own in their

daily lives

beyond a gut feeling that simply exists

it involves active reflection and

strategic

thinking about skills processes

and our surroundings maybe you

already engage with metacognitive

and reflective processes without

realizing it

but for many this is not obvious

and even for those who already believe

in their capabilities becoming aware

of our choices thoughts and actions

gives us ownership instead

of allowing ourselves to coast on

autopilot

along the path of habit

in another research study i asked

university music students to learn

a new instrument and analysis of their

practice

showed that without specific instruction

they reinvented the wheel on the new

instrument

starting from scratch seeing the

differences

instead of the similarities

although you may use the breath to play

the flute and the bow to play the cello

many of the core skills are the same

they didn’t carry their experience

knowledge and self-efficacy with them

to the new task even though they could

have

this makes me wonder if we’re taught

to think believe

be self-directed and have

agency or just to fit in as we

flow through society

without agency without thinking without

belief

are we set up for failure the question i

ask myself

is what am i doing

what are you doing really

what are you doing

are you content to just go along for the

ride

or are you the one driving in your life

that inspiring teacher of mine had a

practice competition once

it wasn’t about how many hours you put

in

but it was about how much progress you

made

how much you learned and i was in that

competition

i did put in my hours but i also used

every strategic fiber in my body to

learn effectively

and efficiently listening

watching paying attention to details

taking care to eat

sleep focus reflect and plan and

in the end i won

that day i was not just riding through

my life

i was driving a

1981 chevy malibu classic

that’s right i won a car that was the

prize

it it was in pretty bad shape and

it didn’t last very long but

i was in the driver’s seat

it’s not such a small world

and there’s a lot to explore

out there and in here

we need to think and take responsibility

for owning our self-efficacy

and realizing our capabilities

through agency

even if you are happy to ride through

life

the one thing that

doesn’t happen for you that can never be

automated

is your own thinking

someone can trick you into not thinking

for yourself

but nobody can take

away your capacity to think

and believe in yourself

only you can believe

in yourself as we gain awareness

and perception of our self-efficacy

beliefs

knowing what factors in our lives affect

and influence us engaging with

metacognitive

thinking and consciously making

decisions

we move beyond awareness to actually

develop our self-efficacy beliefs

awareness allows us to transfer

from one setting to the next by

linking processes beliefs and skills

the foundation of skill and the

confidence of

yes leads us to act

action is our agency

a base of self-efficacy skills

and agency it’s a recipe for change

and the road to more confident

accomplishments with self-efficacy

you may well find a way to be a soloist

maybe not textbook like

carnegie hall or singing halftime show

at the super bowl

but believe me

yes you can

and with each accomplishment your

self-efficacy

is strengthened this goes beyond

thinking you can learn or grow

it’s different from a mindset that

persists through

grit or force people who are aware

of their self-efficacy use

these beliefs as an active source of

motivation

toward untapped possibilities

we engage with ourselves our

surroundings

and we move from belief

to action from self-efficacy

to agency we think

and use strategy to take charge

of our beliefs when you

own your self-efficacy

believe in your yes and know you can

then you have the keys to agency

it’s your turn to be in the driver’s

seat

it’s your turn to go solo

[Music]

you