“Let’s pretend!” Kids are great at letting their imaginations run riot: creating make-believe castles, dragons and – naturally – a beautiful princess or two being rescued by their knight in shining armour (or vice versa!)
As grown-ups, seeking to achieve our goals and dreams, we can lose sight of imagining ‘what if?’ And worse still, we can get caught up in our negativity bias, developing unhelpful thought patterns and limiting self-beliefs.
The risk is that the stories we tell ourselves can, if left unchecked, become our reality, making it harder to change our mind or our behaviour.
Brain Tricks
Our brain likes to play tricks on us. Just as we have to be careful of fake news on the TV, it’s just as important that we aren’t deceiving ourselves with our most popular statements of alternative facts.
“My slow metabolism stops me from being a healthy weight.”
“Exercise and me were just never meant to be.”
“The kids won’t eat vegetables, so there’s no point in buying them.”
Your Brain Hates Change
We’re sorry to tell you this, but your brain would much rather you stayed just the way you are. Why? Because the brain sees change as a potential threat – it disturbs the status quo, where it knows you are safe. Change is also often seen as difficult, and, being inherently lazy, your brain would much rather you didn’t have to deal with all that stinky effort.
You Are What You Repeat
Being creatures of habit means those daily choices – like when to get up, which clothes to wear, which route to take to work, and what to cook for dinner – are based on previous thoughts, ideas and learned experiences.
The more we practice our habits, the more strongly they become embedded. That’s why if it’s normal for you to have a glass of wine while cooking dinner or a cigarette after a meal, you find yourself pouring that first glass or lighting up without thinking.
What helps is, to know how to your brain works, so you can start avoiding its tricks.
Create New Habits
Habits don’t get broken, but they can be replaced with a shiny, new version that’s going to serve you better. Practicing strengthens the habit until it becomes your pattern of first choice.
It takes 66 days on average to embed a new habit and, even then, it’s easy to default to the old way of doing things, especially when you’re under pressure or feeling stressed.
This means that setbacks are totally normal and to be expected. Just acknowledge the slip, and then carry on practicing your new habit.
Know What You Want and Why You Want It
Because the brain is terrible with abstract ideas or future events, write down your goal (writing helps to embed the idea), make it as specific as possible and start to imagine that you’ve already achieved it. Picturing yourself in the future, looking back to see how you got there, helps your brain to adjust to the new you, and to know that’s who you are.
Mind your Language
Check in on that little voice – yes, the one in your head that gets a bit loud and annoying sometimes – as it can undermine your best intentions.
While being positive is a good mental state to aspire to, and will enhance confidence in achieving your goals, replacing negative self-talk with more positive statements only works when the statements are believable and not emotionally-laden. If you’re telling yourself things you know aren’t true, that can diminish your self-esteem and motivation, which isn’t helpful.
Instead, try using ‘yet’ or ‘but’.
As in:
“I haven’t reached my goal yet.” (That suggests you’re on your way!)
“I’m not exercising as much as I’d like, but I’m doing far more than I used to.” (Hurray, let’s keep that progress going!)
While we can easily find ourselves lost in a world of virtual reality, your brain does know the difference between what’s real and what isn’t, most of the time.
Next time you hear yourself using the words ‘I can’t’ or ‘I could, would or should’… Stop, and check-in on their validity. Is your statement fact or opinion?
Change can be tricky, and your brain can hold you back! Knowing how to overcome those mental hurdles will help you to become the healthy, happy person you know you can be.