How cognitive illusions prevent you from building the life you want (part 2B)
If you’re just jumping in to this series, here’s how you can get caught up.
In the intro, I told you how cognitive illusions systematically prevent people from building the lives they want…
By causing them to make decision after decision based on faulty thinking.
And how, once you know what these illusions are, you can combat them with signposts that let you know when you’re in the cognitive illusion zone…
And external structure to help you navigate through the illusion.
In Part 1, we talked through Cognitive Illusion #1: Anchoring to the negative.
And in yesterday’s post, we started talking about Cognitive Illusion #2: Trying to do it “right.”
Yesterday, I walked you through how the illusion works and WHY it leads you to create the life you don’t want. Go back and read that first if you haven’t already!
Today, we’re going to talk about how to combat this illusion.
Alright! So how do we combat this?
Before we get into the signposts and external structure that can combat this cognitive illusion, let me give you some tone-setters for this problem overall.
Being who you really are — and not who you think the rules require you to be — is really hard
e.e. cummings said it best:
“To be nobody-but-yourself — in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else — means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.”
I don’t say that to discourage you.
I say that to reassure you.
If you find this difficult to do — it’s not a You Problem.
It’s because it’s genuinely difficult to do, and you are brave to even attempt it.
Being who you really are is not a process of discovering or creating something that doesn’t exist yet.
It’s a process of excavating what already exists.
I love the way that Emily McDowell said it:
“‘Finding yourself’ is not really how it works. You aren’t a ten-dollar bill in last winter's coat pocket. You are also not lost.
Your true self is right there, buried under cultural conditioning, other people’s opinions, and inaccurate conclusions you drew as a kid that became your beliefs about who you are.
‘Finding yourself’ is actually returning to yourself.
An unlearning, an excavation, a remembering who you were before the world got its hands on you.”
Find your signposts
When you’re trying to do it “right,” according to your brain’s automatic rulebook…
What emotions do you feel?
What physical sensations do you feel?
What do you tend to do?
What do you NOT tend to do?
Here are my answers.
I tend to feel pressured, tense, and slightly afraid.
Physically, my throat feels tighter, it feels like there’s something dragging down in the center of my chest, and my neck and shoulders tense up and start to twinge a bit. I often start to fidget.
I tend to either procrastinate so I can avoid the situation altogether…
…OR (if I can’t avoid it), I start resigning myself to tradeoffs, chastising myself for wanting such stupid, lazy, inconvenient things, and forcing myself to do what I “need” to do.
I start scanning myself for everything else I’m doing wrong. Suddenly, LOTS of other examples will occur to me. “I’m screwing THIS up and THAT up and also THAT.” It feels like a massive pile-on of all my wrong-ness.
I also wonder what’s wrong with me, that I can’t just be the way I’m supposed to be. “I need to be more disciplined. Why can’t I just get it together?” etc.
I don’t think about anything I’m doing right — I literally just forget about all that stuff.
I don’t question or chastise the rulebook. I only question and chastise myself for not being able to follow it.
When any or all of those things happen, I know I’m in the “trying to do it ‘right’” cognitive illusion zone.
I need to stop trusting my automatic instincts and use external structure to navigate through.
Suggested external structure
When you’re caught in this illusion, your brain is stuck on one axis:
Right ←——→ Wrong
It’s sliding back and forth across this axis and trying to find the best place on it.
But right vs. wrong is the wrong question to be asking.
You don’t need to find your place on this axis.
You need to jump to a different axis on a different plane altogether — a completely different paradigm.
An axis like:
More like myself ←——→ Less like myself
or
More of the different parts of me are aligned, integrated, and congruent with each other
←——→
Fewer of the different parts of me are aligned, integrated, and congruent with each other
or
More of the different parts of myself are represented and fully cared for in the final answer
←——→
Fewer of the different parts of myself are represented and fully cared for in the final answer. Some parts of me have to be squashed down or chopped off or shut away in a box to make this answer work.
Now I’m going to say something very important.
These are not just new versions of the right/wrong paradigm.
Being more yourself is not RIGHT. Being less yourself is not WRONG.
Being more internally aligned or more internally congruent is not RIGHT. Being less internally aligned or less internally congruent is not WRONG.
Neither side of these axes is right or wrong.
These are completely different paradigms.
Asking “So which side of this new axis is right and which is wrong?”…
…is kind of like asking a gay couple: So who’s the man and who’s the woman in the relationship?
That question doesn’t make sense because there isn’t a man and a woman in the relationship.
You can’t define the relationship in terms of “the man” and “the woman” because the relationship doesn’t fit the heterosexual paradigm.
When your brain asks that question, what it’s really trying to do is hold on to the old paradigm by making this new thing fit within the old paradigm’s terms.
You have to catch that your brain is doing that and say:
“No, that question doesn’t make sense. That’s like asking ‘Is 30 minutes red or blue?’
You can’t describe units of time in terms of colors.
You can’t describe a gay couple in terms of “the man” and “the woman.”
And you can’t describe being more or less yourself, more or less internally aligned, more or less internally congruent in terms of “right” and “wrong.”
All these things exist on totally different planes of meaning.”
Your brain may try to hang on to the old paradigm. That’s what it’s supposed to do. (Nothing is going wrong here.)
But if it does, it’s very important that you catch it and push it to think in terms of a totally new paradigm and NOT to just think of this as “right and wrong, but with more words attached.”
Because if you don’t catch your brain on this and push it to actually create a NEW paradigm rather than just defining everything in terms of the old one…
…you’ll accidentally end up creating a NEW way for you to be right or wrong.
… and you’ll accidentally trap yourself further in the right/wrong dynamic, instead of freeing yourself from it.
So here’s what I suggest you do, specifically, in the moment
First, notice the signpost.
Then, use the signpost as your trigger to jump to the new paradigm.
Here’s how I do it for myself—
I feel the pressure and the tension and the tight throat and the tense neck and shoulders.
I notice my brain REALLY wants to work on the question: “How do I do this RIGHT?” and figure out how to follow the rulebook as well as possible.
And I stop and say:
Nope. That’s the wrong question to be asking. Let’s work on this question instead:
How is this an opportunity to excavate who I really am?
How is this an opportunity to be even MORE myself?
How can I do this really like MYSELF?
And I work on those questions instead.
Overall, think of this like building a new habit.
James Clear talks about habits having 4 components: cue, craving, response, and reward.
You currently have a mental habit of trying to do it “right.”
Something happens. You look at your to-do list. You get into a meeting with your boss. You’re at a party where you don’t know anyone. It’s 1 am and you’re lying in bed, unable to sleep. That’s the cue.
You feel the emotions and sensations. Your brain really wants to figure out how to do it “right” in this situation. That’s the craving.
You believe your brain and start working on the question: “How can I do it right?” and worrying about all the ways you’re doing it wrong. That’s the response.
You feel like you’re managing the threat and that you’re on the right track — that you WILL be safe / loved / good enough / etc. if you can just do it right. That’s the reward.
(It’s weird to think of it as a reward, because it’s often very stressful to try to do it right and scan yourself for everything you’re doing wrong all the time.
But when you believe doing it wrong is dangerous, it’s even MORE stressful to NOT try to do it right and NOT to scan yourself for wrongs.
Doesn’t it feel even scarier to say “It doesn’t matter whether I do it right or not” or “Who cares, I’ll just let it be bad.”?
So that’s the relief and safety and “reward” that comes from following your craving and working on the question: “How can I do it right?” and worrying about all the ways you’re doing it wrong…
You feel like doing all this is keeping you safe from the super scary scenario of doing it wrong.)
This is the habit loop that you have to interrupt with whatever external structure you choose.
All the same cues will still happen. Same meetings, same to-do lists, same parties, same quiet nights alone with your thoughts.
You’ll still have the same craving to figure out how to do it “right” and worry about all the ways you’re doing it wrong.
But you put in a new response to the craving.
Instead of going with the usual response of trying to figure out how to do it right and worrying about how you’re doing it wrong…
Go with a NEW response like:
Asking: How is this an opportunity to be even MORE myself?
Or asking: What AM I doing right? (and therefore anchoring to the positive rather than the negative)
Or anything else!
And then give yourself a reward.
The reward could be inherent — if the new response makes you feel better and shifts you into a different mode of thinking and feeling and being.
Or it could be a small external reward. Pat yourself on the back (literally). Give yourself a little hug (literally). Smile and drop your shoulders for a second or two.
Just give yourself a tiny boost of positive reinforcement to close the loop on this new habit.
It’s okay if your brain is SUPER hooked onto its old habit of trying to do things “right.”
This pattern-interrupt process uses that to your advantage.
You don’t need the cues to go away.
You don’t need your craving to do it “right” and ruminate about your wrongs to go away.
Because every time your brain goes to its old habitual place, you can use that as the jumping off point to get another rep on your new habit.
The MORE stuck your brain is on the old habit, the MORE reps you’ll get on the new habit.
And reps are what cement a new habit into your brain.
The more reps you get every hour or day or week, the faster your brain will put your new habit on autopilot.
And don’t worry about getting it right 100% of the time.
I’ll talk more about this tomorrow, when I talk about common pitfalls people run into when combating this cognitive illusion.
But the goal here is not to “think the right thoughts” 100% of the time (that’s just the right/wrong paradigm popping up again!).
The goal is just to get regular reps.
Quantity creates quality.
Even if it feels awkward or fake or stupid or unnatural for the first few days or weeks…
Just keep getting reps and let the rest take care of itself.
And if you want to ensure that you get this DONE.
That you fully rewire your brain to stop falling for the illusion of trying to do it “right”…
…and to instead build the habit of being YOURSELF in all the moments and decisions in your life, both big and small.
There’s no better way to get that done than hiring a coach.
This is exactly what I help people do, day in and day out.
And I can help you too. Let’s get started.
⬅️ Part 2A || Part 2C ➡️
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