The growth mindset

Delivered April 25, 2025 @ 5:00pm ET

Weather in Bloomington, Indiana - Cloudy/Rainy, 24⁰ C / 76⁰ F

Table of Contents

• Updates in the Democratize Venture Space

• Doriot Product/Program Updates

• This Week’s Lesson: The Growth Mindset

  • 🧠 What the Research Says

  • 🚫 The Fixed Mindset

  • ✅ The Growth Mindset

  • 🧭 My Personal Reframe

My name is Gerry Hays, and for lack of a better description, I’m the custodian and convener of Doriot, a movement to break open the gates of venture and expand innovation and wealth beyond an elite few. Democratize Venture is my platform to explore the venture markets and share the insights, strategies, and frameworks I bring into the classroom. It’s where education meets execution—for anyone ready to play the startup game.

Updates in the Democratize Venture Space

• Paul Atkins was sworn in as Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission this week. He is stepping into an SEC that has already undergone several sweeping changes under the leadership of Acting Chair Mark Uyeda, who focused on downsizing the agency and easing enforcement actions against crypto companies. Chairman Atkins is promising a clear regulatory structure for crypto that protects investors, but achieving this will be easier said than done, as we have highlighted in previous updates;

• LinkedIN Post: The VC Emperor has no clothes. Venture capital has strayed far from its original mission. What began as a bold bet on breakthrough ideas has become a game of management fees, downside protection, and inflated valuations—often at the expense of actual exits.

• LinkedIN Post: Delete all IP law. This position—pushed by billionaires like Elon Musk and Jack Dorsey—is one we strongly oppose. Intellectual property is the only real defense smaller innovators have against companies with billions in their war chest. Undermining IP doesn't level the playing field—it erases it.

  If the goal is to gut capitalism and kill competition, this is exactly how you do it.

Doriot Product/Program Updates

• Our latest innovation, VentureStaking™, has been incredibly well received by the broader public. We’re building a global marketplace that allows anyone to purchase the right—not the obligation—to invest in a startup’s future rounds. This model gives people the ability to build a diversified portfolio of startups for pennies, not dollars, reducing risk by up to 90%.

  We’ve launched the first-ever VentureStaking™ round at www.doriot.com, where “anyone” can VentureStake™ Doriot’s mission and experience this new innovation firsthand.

• Never made a startup investment before? Fantasy Startup is for you.

  We give you $500 in virtual capital and 50 real startups. Your job: build a winning portfolio and see how it performs.

  Learn how the Power Law of venture works—and how one big win can change everything. Now available at Doriot University.

• QAI – Qualified Accredited Investor
  Ready to master the game of venture? QAI delivers elite-level venture education at a fraction of the cost of traditional programs.

  Learn the secrets top VCs and angels know—so you can think, evaluate, and invest like a pro.
  Now available at Doriot University.

This Week’s Lesson: The Growth Mindset

Years ago, I stumbled into a trap that most founders know all too well:
Feeling like a failure—even when things were working.

Why? Because I kept moving the goalposts.
Every time I hit a milestone, I didn’t stop to reflect or reward the effort.
I just set a new, bigger goal. And if that next one didn’t materialize fast enough, I spiraled into doubt.

But then I found Carol Dweck’s work on growth mindset, and it was like the lights came on.

🧠 What the Research Says

In one of the most groundbreaking studies in education and psychology, Dweck and her team ran seven experiments with hundreds of kids. The result?

• Children praised for being “smart” gave up when they hit a challenge.

• Children praised for effort kept pushing—even when things got hard.

That simple insight formed the foundation of Growth Mindset vs. Fixed Mindset thinking.

🚫 The Fixed Mindset

• Believes talent is static

• Fears failure (“If I fail, I must not be smart”)

• Craves validation

• Avoids hard challenges

✅ The Growth Mindset

• Believes abilities can be developed

• Sees effort as the path to mastery

• Welcomes feedback

• Values process over perfection

🧭 My Personal Reframe

Dweck’s ideas helped me reframe how I see entrepreneurship.

Winston Churchill famously said: “Success is moving from one failure to the next without loss of enthusiasm.”

That’s close—but for me, a better version is: “Success is moving from one burst of effort to the next”

Because that’s what entrepreneurship is:

• A burst of effort to understand a problem

• A burst of effort to build a solution

• A burst of effort to distribute that solution

You’re not always winning.
You’re not always failing.
You’re consistently becoming, through effort.

And that’s the real magic of a growth mindset. It’s not just motivational fluff.
It’s the toolkit for resilience. It’s how we navigate ambiguity, setbacks, and reinvention.

Whether you're a founder, student, athlete, or parent—this shift matters.
Stop chasing perfection. Stop clinging to identity.

Get out of the game of labels.
Get into the state of becoming.

That’s where growth lives.
That’s where peace lives.
And that’s where the future is built.

Have a great weekend! -gerry ([email protected])