Brain-Based Transformational Solutions
Discovery isn’t really finding something you’re expecting.
It’s finding something that you couldn’t possibly dream of.
But realizing that it’s important.
That’s really the heart of discovery.
The big things are the unexpected.
–Paleontologist Paul Sereno
Because each of us is in the middle of a story we don’t know the ending to. We all have farther to go.
Thanks to www.womenworking.com. I couldn’t agree more!
Those who pursue happiness tend to focus on feeling good and getting what they want in the short-term (satisfying drives). Happy people report less stress or worry. Animals can be happy, too. It’s been said that what sets humans apart from the animals is the pursuit of meaning. People who are more focused on meaning than on happiness are invested in something outside themselves. They tend to experience more stress and anxiety than happy people do, but the rub is that even when they are suffering, the people who have created meaning in their lives report a higher level of satisfaction than those who don’t have meaning in their lives.
Whether we aim for short-term rewards or keep our eyes on the long-term prize, all of us have two different decision-making systems, both of which are involved each time we have to make a decision or choice. System 1, which is more primitive, is associated with immediate gratification. It responds to sensory stimuli and directly involves the limbic system and our basic emotions. System 2 involves the prefrontal cortex and is responsible for long-range thinking and planning.
Think of the brain as a two-story bungalow. The bottom or first floor got built first and contains a young and rowdy couple. They play loud music, throw wild parties and are up at all hours. Later a second-story extension got built on top and an older and more practical couple moved in. They like to tend the garden and pay off their mortgage. At times, the two couples agree about how the household should be run but, with such differences in values, there are plenty of disagreements. –Piers Steel, Ph.D.
If you don’t have something meaningful on which you are focused, most of your decisions are likely to be in the hands of the rowdy couple on the first floor. Even if you decide there’s something you want that requires foregoing immediate gratification, you may struggle with following through.
The reality is that even though so many people are in pursuit of it—especially in places like the U.S.—happiness can be elusive. For one thing, happiness is an emotion, and by its nature, transient. For another pursuing personal happiness is associated with selfishness and being a “taker,” while pursuing or creating meaning is associated with being a “giver.”
If you focus on creating meaning in your life, you are likely to be more satisfied. Happiness may or may not be a byproduct. If you focus on pursuing happiness, you will presumably be happy, but less satisfied. If it’s the pursuit of meaning that makes us uniquely human, then pursing happiness doesn’t seem like the best path for humans to be on.
Happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue. One must have a reason to “be happy.” –Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning
What keeps us from achieving the things we want or even set out to achieve? Science writer David DiSalvo (What Makes Your Brain Happy and Why You Should Do the Opposite) seems to like why questions—which I’m on record as opposing. He wrote an article for Forbes titled “The 10 Reasons Why We Fail,” which he describes as reflections on falling short—more precisely, why we fail despite ourselves.
Two of his reasons—the first and last, as it happens—really resonate for me based on my own experience and the experiences of friends and acquaintances.
Luke: I can’t believe it.
Yoda: That is why you fail.The crucial part of Yoda’s dialogue with Luke is “believe.” The human brain is a powerful problem-solving and prediction making machine, and it operates via a multitude of feedback loops. What matters most in the feedback loop dynamic is input—what goes into the loop that begins the analysis-evaluation-action process, which ultimately results in an outcome. Here’s the kicker: if your input shuttle for achieving a goal lacks the critical, emotionally relevant component of belief, then the feedback loop is drained of octane from the start. Another way to say that is—why would you expect a convincingly successful outcome when you haven’t convinced yourself that it’s possible?
Believing you can do something is a precursor to intentionally changing or initiating a habit. If you start out believing you can’t do it, you will more than likely fulfill that prophecy.
Of all of these 10 ideas, this one is to me the most difficult because it plagues me almost constantly. Gearing up the cerebral feedback loop for achievement is one thing, but without a sense of focus and direction, all of that energy isn’t going to yield very much in the end. My experience has been that sometimes you have to let the energy flow for a while without too firm a sense of direction and see if focus emerges organically. Once it does, you can then nurture it into a more structured method for getting where you want to go.
Confusion abounds, especially when people think they ought to know what to do and where to go, but don’t. There are several ways to prime the pump to gain some clarity about what to do next. Often, however, we and our brains are so frantically busy going in whatever direction we’re going that we can’t slow down enough to realize we don’t actually know what the heck we’re doing.