Abundance Mindset

I recently watched the Netflix series “How to Become a Tyrant” and found its narrative particularly interesting. It is told like a guidebook for aspiring tyrants and explains how they view their actions, often with an ironic tone. For this reason, the “you” in the following article is addressed to a fictional tyrant. Let’s start with the fact that all six tyrants covered in the series have a common theme: fear of freedom of thought.

In the beginning, they usually work hard to seize power and (some) have even genuine intentions to reform society for the better, but they do not tolerate dissent. This is the crucial point that turns a political person into a tyrant. In fact, censorship and isolation from other countries come precisely to avoid any judgement.

The underlying assumption of this behaviour is the belief that other people can’t add value to your thinking, and the outcome is self-referential leadership. Trying to impose your view by censoring all others has two consequences: firstly, you lose all the potential of diversity and freedom of thought; secondly, it is not a long-term system because the repressed thoughts often arise abruptly if you try to alleviate censorship or lose your power.

In the end, placing value on other ways of thinking is the assumption that allows a healthy debate. In this way, democracies are a bit messier in the short term but more stable in the long run. In our individual lives, this can be pursued by listening and assuming that everyone can add value to our thought (starting from entrepreneurial ideas💡).

The mentality can also affect the willingness to take risks and be bold. For example, if in a test you start from 10 and the grade decreases as you make mistakes, you are incentivized to play safe. Otherwise, if you start from 0 and go upward, taking a bold move would probably be more rewarded.

Luca Bisi