People Do Not Change?

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

What are habitual forms of behavior, habitual forms of emotional response, emotional response to external and internal events?

It so happens that a person, due to certain circumstances - either on his own or with the help of a psychologist - suddenly expands the range of his perception and begins to see, notice what and where he is doing wrong. Inspired by his insight, he gives himself a word that now he has understood everything and there is no longer a place for old habits in his life!

But it was not there…

A certain (familiar) situation emerges that has happened to him more than once, which has set the teeth on edge with its regularity and a fair amount of destructive influence, and our man, enlightened by understanding, again walks along the knurled one … And again failure, again the same: the same quarrels, resentments, misunderstanding, the same annoyance, pain and anger inside. Sayings about the unfortunate hunchback, who can only be corrected by the grave, just from here. And all the statements about the fact that people do not change, too. Apathy sets in, disappointment in oneself and others, self-esteem falls, hands give up and faith is lost in what seemed so obvious just yesterday, so kind of accepted in a new way. In other words, there is a rollback into the previous, habitual patterns of behavior and experiences.

Sad, isn't it?

Why is it so difficult, even after realizing your mistakes in actions and deeds, and how much these or those negative emotional states destroy you, "get rid" of them, stop stepping on the same rake many times? Often a person very sincerely desires changes, but why is it not immediately and not always enough to rethink his life or some of its aspects? Why, in crisis, extreme from a psychological point of view, moments, as if something clicks and makes you slide down the obviously losing path of spoiled relationships with yourself and others?

It turns out that the point is in the head, namely, in the neural connections of the brain!

From early childhood, we learn different forms of behavior, learn about feelings and learn to emotionally respond to a wide range of life events, from minor to crucial. We learn to experience, live and show both positive (approved and allowed, at the very beginning, by our moms and dads) and show, and sometimes suppress (also in the image and likeness of our parents) the widest range of feelings and emotions. And these methods, unfortunately, do not always have a healthy form. The same applies equally to behavior.

From time to time, as the same reactions are repeated, a "path" of neural connections is fixed in the brain, which is triggered whenever there is a corresponding stimulus from the outside or from the inside. As you can imagine, there are a lot of such paths of neural connections (billions !!) and they accompany all areas of our life.

And the complexity in human changes lies in a simple, but also very complex fact, which says that to create a new neural connection (read a new way of behavioral or emotional response, habit, attitude, motivation, etc.), it takes time and quantity repetitions (ideally, successful), understanding (which was written about at the beginning), awareness of their former not entirely healthy patterns, as well as the desire to change them and specific actions aimed at change. In this sense, our brain responds to us in the form of such a phenomenon as neuroplasticity.

That is, people are still capable and can change!

Neuroplasticity suggests that the brain is able to undergo changes as new experiences appear: new knowledge, skills, and abilities. This means that a person can "trample" new neural connections, strengthen them and achieve a new style of interaction with himself and the world.

Psychologist Amalia Tarkhanova.