Unconscious Archives - Farther to Go!

How Your Mindset Sets You Up

April 8, 2019 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

A mindset is the set of ideas, beliefs, or attitudes with which you approach situations or people—or through which you view them. It determines how you interpret situations and respond to them. Mindsets have something in common with habits since they tend to be habitual, which means largely unconscious. They are a type of mental shortcut; they operate based on assumptions, and they generate expectations.

You can have mindsets about yourself, other people or groups of people, places, situations, events, political organizations, types of music—actually just about anything. A mindset can have surprisingly deep and far-reaching effects.

Mindsets Are Self-Reinforcing

You’ve probably heard someone described as having a victim mentality, which is the same as having a victim mindset. If you have a victim mindset you would tend to:

feel that others are to blame for your misfortunes
believe you are powerless to alter your circumstances
have a primarily external locus of control
be disinclined to take personal responsibility
distrust other people
fail to take positive action on your own behalf

The first three attitudes and beliefs lead to the subsequent three behaviors—which, in turn, confirm the attitudes and beliefs. Like any mindset, a victim mindset causes you to view situations, events, and interpersonal relationships through a distorted filter. It leads you to believe your perception isreality. That’s one of the ways your mindset sets you up.

A Few Other Mindsets (Labels)

I’ve written about the productivity vs. creativity mindsets. Here are some others to consider.

Survivalist
Globalist
Entrepreneurial
Lifelong Learner
Achiever
Maker
Activist
Liberal
Conservative
Libertarian
Progressive
Outsider

Recognizing and Changing a Mindset

When examining a mindset, it’s important to know what it is, when it’s in effect, and how it affects your perception, interpretation, and response. But trying to understand where it came from or how it developed is a side trip that won’t get you closer to altering it. (It doesn’t matter how you came to possess the diffusion filter for your camera lens. Once you install it, it affects what you see when you look through the lens.) Instead, focus on determining your mindset’s attributes: what beliefs, attitudes, personality traits, etc. are part of it?

One of the best ways to catch your mindset in the act is to notice when your expectations of a person or a situation are not met. Instead of pausing to consider the source of your expectations, your brain is more likely to jump into action to find a suitable explanation that will allow you to comfortably fit the experience into your ongoing inner narrative. Unfortunately, even when reality conflicts with your mindset, your brain’s tendency is to interpret what happens in a way that reinforces your mindset.

After you develop an understanding of a mindset you want to change:

Clarify why you want to change it.
Determine your desired outcome.
Identify one situation to change.

Remember that it’s easier to focus on and change a behavior (what you do) than it is to focus on and change a thought, a thought pattern, or a belief. Create an intention to change your behavior in one situation and apply repetition and perseverance until the new behavior or response becomes the status quo.

It isn’t easy to recognize or change a mindset, but if you focus on the mechanics (what, when, and how), you can do it. And it’s worth the effort to open your mind, shift your perspective, and learn how to adjust your personal camera lens filters so you aren’t stuck with whatever lenses you happen to have developed over the course of your life.

Habits: The Dirty Lowdown

January 31, 2018 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

In order to create or change a habit, you have to retrain your brain. Your brain, however, actively resists your attempts to retrain it, viewing your interference as not only unwelcome but also potentially dangerous. Fortunately, as far as your brain is concerned, history indicates you’re not very adept at this retraining stuff. Plus you usually give up way too easily and quickly. So your brain doesn’t consider you much of an actual threat.

There’s something to be said for your brain’s point of view. But it’s not good news for you. Your habits can either provide the scaffolding that supports your endeavors or they can completely derail you. They affect every aspect of your life. If you want your life to be a consistently satisfying and meaningful one, you need to be able to reliably manage your habits.

Here are five facts to help you understand habits from your brain’s perspective.

1. Your Brain Has the “Habit” Habit.

It is primed to turn behaviors into habits, with or without your participation, in order to save energy. Habits make up the bulk of your behavior.
.
Your brain does not share your opinions or judgments about whether your habits are good or bad. As far as your brain is concerned, any habit is a good habit.
.
To succeed: Use your brain’s “habit” habit to your advantage instead of letting it run unfettered.

2. Habitual Behavior Is Unconscious.

Once a behavior becomes a habit, you no longer have conscious control over it.
.
The fact that you understand the benefit of doing (or not doing) something has absolutely no impact on the part of your brain that runs your habits.
.
To succeed: Communicate with your brain by your actions, not by your thoughts and good intentions. Your brain responds to repetition and persistence.

3. Your Brain Is Predictive Rather than Reactive.

Your brain is constantly trying to figure out what’s going on, what it means, and what you should do about it.
.
By the time you’re aware you’re about to do something, you have less than two-tenths of a second to veto your brain’s directive.
.
To succeed: Since your brain is always planning ahead, you have to plan ahead, too.

4. Habits are More than Behaviors.

Habits consist of three parts: a cue or trigger, a routine (the actual behavior), and a reward. This is known as the habit loop.
.
Your brain is motivated to move you toward anything it finds rewarding.
.
To succeed: Accept, understand, and use your brain’s reward system.

5. Your Brain Is Profoundly Averse to Change.

Your brain uses its considerable processing power and speed to maintain the status quo.
.
To change the status quo, you must have a very compelling why (10 on a scale of 1-10).
.
To succeed: Identify your desired outcome, not just your objective! (How is your status quo going to change once you successfully create or modify a particular habit?)

The good news is that once you’ve created a positive new habit or changed an existing negative one, your brain will dedicate itself to maintaining your new status quo just as zealously as it did the old one.

E Is for Enneagram

June 7, 2017 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

The Enneagram is a straightforward, yet rich and complex system that describes our individual strengths and weaknesses, deeper-level motivations, and most importantly, the compulsions that often rule our lives. Although we’re wired to operate under the impression that we’re consciously choosing what we do, most of the time we’re at the effect of unconscious impulses. We’re living our lives on autopilot; asleep at the wheel, doing the same things over and over again, expecting different outcomes.

As I wrote in A Is for Autopilot:

Estimates are that close to 80% or more of what we do every day we do on autopilot, which means without conscious intention or volition. It’s not just what we do, either. The majority of our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are the result of automatic brain processes.

As neuroscientist David Eagleman says:

Our brains run mostly on autopilot, and the conscious mind has little access to the giant and mysterious factory that runs below it.

When you look outward at the world—or even inward at yourself—you see things not as they are but as you are. You view the world through your own set of filters, biases, opinions, judgments, personal experiences, and temperament. You act and react as you do—and not as someone else might—because you’re looking out from within your own model of the world. Your model of the world influences what you pay attention to, how you interpret and react to events, the meaning you assign to them, and most of what you think, feel, do, and say. When it comes to trying to change the status quo, your preexisting model of the world is your most formidable obstacle.

In order to create and sustain positive change, you have to change your model of the world. But how can you change something you can’t see—the very lens you see through?

That’s where the Enneagram comes in. It offers each of us a window into our particular model of the world so we can develop the self-awareness that’s essential for creating change.

The Enneagram is the most practical and accurate tool I’ve found for describing our basic temperament or personality, and therefore our habits of thinking, feeling, and behaving. (Other typing systems include the MBTI, OCEAN [a/k/a Big Five], DISC, and Social Styles.) The Enneagram is comprehensive and multifaceted, so it requires some effort to fully grasp. But it’s worth it. When you identify your type, you may find that the Enneagram knows you better than you knew yourself. It isn’t the personality equivalent of a Theory of Everything, but it gives you a place to look, a way to pay attention to what you’re doing, thinking, and feeling.

In a Nutshell

Enneagram is a Greek word that means nine points. The Enneagram symbol is composed of a triangle and a hexad within a circle. The triangle connects points 3, 6, and 9. The hexad connects points 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, and 8.

The 9 points represent 9 basic, or core, personality types, each of which has a unique perspective and approach to life. We tend to polarize near one of those points, as a result we overdevelop some areas and underdevelop others. That polarization strongly affects how and what we perceive of the world around us—and how we respond to what we perceive. Our perceptions and responses become so much a part of us that they occur automatically, without any conscious thought.

One way to think about the Enneagram is that each point represents a particular kind of imbalance. (It’s easier to spot imbalances in others than it is to recognize them in ourselves. So it can be tempting to “helpfully” point out those imbalances to friends, family members, and co-workers. It is also tempting to stereotype people because categorizing is an automatic process of the brain.)

The Enneagram can make you more aware of your particular autopilot behavior. It can show you how you tend to operate, in both positive and constructive ways, as well as in negative and sometimes destructive ways. Your core personality type doesn’t change over the course of a lifetime, but as you become aware of your tendencies and imbalances, you gain the ability to moderate them. You’re no longer run by them.

Some people believe that being typed diminishes them somehow, that typing puts them into a box. But typing doesn’t put people into boxes; it identifies aspects of the boxes we’re already in. It points out what’s inside the box and what’s outside, both of which are equally important.

The Nine Types

Very briefly, these are the nine types:

Type 1: The Good Person, the Achiever, the Reformer, the Perfectionist. Principled and responsible, but can also be rule-bound and critical.

Type 2: The Helper, the Giver, the People Pleaser, the Partner. Compassionate and altruistic, but can also be co-dependent and manipulative.

Type 3: The Performer, the Succeeder, the Motivator, and the Status Seeker. Self-assured and accomplished, but can also be competitive and performance-driven.

Type 4: The Individualist, the Tragic Romantic, the Artist, the Sensitive Person. Creative and inspiring, but can also be overly dramatic and fault-finding.

Type 5: The Observer, the Investigator, the Knowledge-Seeker, the Thinker. Perceptive and curious, but can also be cold and detached.

Type 6: The Loyalist, the Questioner, the Guardian, the Devil’s Advocate. Organized and hard-working, but can also be indecisive and overly-vigilant.

Type 7: The Adventurer, the Epicure, the Generalist, the Enthusiast. Cheerful and multi-talented, but can also be acquisitive and thrill-seeking.

Type 8: The Challenger, the Confronter, the Leader, the Asserter. Courageous and magnanimous, but can also be combative and domineering.

Type 9: The Peacemaker, the Preservationist, the Mediator, the Universalist. Deeply receptive and serene, but can also be disengaged and inattentive.

When it comes to creating change, the greatest benefit of learning about your Enneagram type is discovering how you repeatedly get in your own way. Without that knowledge, your efforts are likely to lead to frustration more often than to success.

For more information about the Enneagram, visit ninepaths.com.

Part of the series A-Z: An Alphabet of Change.

Give Up Choice; Get What You Really Want

February 26, 2016 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

Being clear about what you really want and why you want it is essential if you want to bring about a behavioral change. The what and the why provide you with direction: your highly desirable outcome. But if you don’t feel a sense of urgency about creating that outcome, you’re likely to continue operating on the assumption that you can choose whether or not to do what you need to do to get there.

If you want to change the status quo, the outcome you’re after has to be so compelling that you’re willing to give up the freedom to not have it. I’ll give you a personal example.

Vitality is a highly desirable outcome for me. One thing that contributes significantly to my level of vitality is a combination of physical activities, such as walking, hiking, using a treadmill, and strength training. I generally enjoy doing those things as much as I enjoy the results of doing them. A couple of years ago, I had a much more regular schedule that allowed me to walk nearly every morning, hike a couple of times a month, and get in four strength training sessions a week at the gym. But that hasn’t been the case for the past year.

When my schedule changed, my level of physical activity declined and became hit-or-miss instead of regular. At the beginning of last summer, I decided to start walking for 25-35 minutes every day. That seemed like something I could reasonably commit to. Although it wasn’t ideal, it was a start. So from May 31^st through today, I have walked or walked and used a treadmill every single day, no exceptions.

In September, I decided to increase my target to 45 minutes a day and have reached that most days. In December, I took a deeper look at how important vitality really is to me (VERY!) and realized that walking wasn’t enough. I get a better aerobic workout on a treadmill. In fact, I’d made a few attempts to get over to the gym to use the treadmill in the fall, but didn’t get far because I felt like I had a choice as to whether or not to do it. On December 19th, after an insanely busy two weeks, I decided to start using the treadmill three times a week, no exceptions. Since the best I’d managed during the previous 12 months was three times in one month, I may have been overly optimistic.

But even though my schedule isn’t any more accommodating than it was before, I am now using the treadmill three times a week. The difference is that having decided to do it, I stopped giving myself a choice. I schedule the day and time I’m going to go to the gym. I may have to reschedule once in a while, but because I have no choice, I always get my three sessions in.

Going to the gym brought home to me how much I miss strength training and how wonderful I felt when I was doing it. I had a portable weight bench in the garage and a few sets of hand weights in a closet, and I realized that even if I couldn’t go to the gym to do it, I could do some upper body strength training at home. So on January 1^st, I decided to include three 30-minute sessions of upper-body strength training each week, no exceptions.

Of course, I feel much better as a result of all of the increased physical activity, but maintaining this schedule is far from easy or comfortable. It’s winter now, and on the days I’m scheduled to walk outside for 45 minutes, the wind chill might be in the mid-20s, and snow might be blowing directly in my face. Winter, to put it mildly, is not my favorite season. I’ve been known to hike in the Sandia foothills when the temperature was in the mid-90s. If I could dress in shorts, T-shirt, and sandals all year, I would be ecstatic. But as I’m writing this, we’ve just had three brutally windy and cold days in a row, the coldest so far this winter. If I gave myself a choice as to whether or not to put on multiple layers of clothing and subject myself to the elements, I would never do it.

But having made the decision to invest in my vitality, I’m willing to tolerate (not always silently) the discomfort and occasional pain in the moment for the medium and long-term outcomes I’m after. And because I don’t have a choice in the matter, I don’t waste any time whatsoever debating whether or not to follow through or trying to talk myself in or out of doing what I have decided to do.

When the path ahead is clear, why wouldn’t you take the obvious next step?

By giving up the freedom to not have it, I get to have what I really want. And although it isn’t always easy, it is astonishingly simple.

Note: This is the fourth in a series of posts. To follow the thread, select the category Making Different Choices in the box under Explore.

How Do Decisions Affect Your Choices?

February 19, 2016 by Joycelyn Campbell Leave a Comment

Moment-to-moment, the vast majority of the choices you seem to be making are being made for you by the unconscious part of your brain. You do have both the ability and the opportunity to affect your choices, but you may not be making the best use of either.

The terms choice and decision are often used interchangeably, which muddies our understanding of the process of taking one action instead of another. So let’s make a distinction.

A decision is a conclusion you reach after some consideration of a significant issue. It involves thinking or deliberation. That means a decision is a result of a conscious (System 2) process. Some examples are: moving to a new city or staying where you are; keeping your current job or looking for a new one; trying to iron out the problems in your relationship or separating from your partner.

A choice, on the other hand, is more immediate and—at least in the short term—usually less consequential. Choices are generally the result of unconscious (System 1) predictions and responses. Some examples are: selecting from a restaurant menu; determining which movie to see; getting up with the alarm or hitting the snooze button.

Over time, the choices you make add up: to an outcome you want or to an outcome you don’t want. If you hit the snooze button every morning instead of getting up when you need to, you could end up getting to work late often enough that your employer notices. That’s probably not a desirable outcome. If you regularly select healthy meals in restaurants, you could end up maintaining a healthy weight or improving your sense of well-being, either of which is a desirable outcome.

If you don’t have much influence over your moment-to-moment choices, how can you influence them to add up to outcomes you want instead of outcomes you don’t want?

If you want your choices to add up to positive outcomes, you need to clearly identify what those positive outcomes are. Not only do you need to know what outcomes you want, you also need to be clear about why you want those outcomes. Identifying the what and the why requires conscious deliberation, and anything that requires conscious deliberation is energy intensive for your brain.

The decision-making process is sometimes protracted and even painful. For many people, it involves making a list of pros and cons, which is not a particularly effective strategy. Trying to imagine how you will feel if you achieve a specific outcome is also ineffective. There’s plenty of research to indicate that humans are notoriously poor at affective forecasting (being able to predict how we will feel in the future). No matter how much time you invest or how carefully you consider your options, you still can’t guarantee you’ll be happy with the outcome.

That’s why the default response is to throw up one’s hands and give in to following the path of least resistance. It means letting your brain continue choosing for you because it’s just so much easier. Learning how to use your brain to regulate your behavior (choices) definitely does not come naturally or easily.

Given that the unconscious part of your brain is completely capable of making the majority of your choices for you—with no input from you—why bother expending energy and mental effort on decision-making or trying to change your behavior?

The short answer is because you have consciousness. You’re driven to try to change your behavior because you can imagine outcomes other than the ones you have gotten or are likely to get if you continue along the path you’re on. Simply following the path of least resistance may be easy, but it isn’t satisfying and it doesn’t provide you with a sense of meaning.

In order to have a meaningful and satisfying life you need to master the process of changing the status quo.

So…what do you want to change? And why do you want to change it? If you can’t answer those two questions, the how is irrelevant.

Note: This is the third in a series of posts. To follow the thread, select the category Making Different Choices in the box under Explore.