The Relationship Of Bad Decisions

Video: The Relationship Of Bad Decisions

Video: The Relationship Of Bad Decisions
Video: Reading Strangers' Wrong Decisions in Relationships 2024, March
The Relationship Of Bad Decisions
The Relationship Of Bad Decisions
Anonim

To maintain our level of consciousness, our large brain performs an important task - it provides a coherent (interconnected) picture of the world with an incredibly large flow of information that comes through our senses.

We need brain-generated coherence to remind me that I am the same person today as I was yesterday, that I will someday die, that between now and then I will grow old, so that I can better plan and use my allotted time. Mental coherence helps us understand the importance of the sound of the crying baby in the next room and what needs to be paid attention to, while the annoying hum of the refrigerator can be ignored. Without coherence, we would be like schizophrenics, unable to filter out environmental stimuli and respond to received information that does not matter or even diverge from external reality.

Coherence - like knowledge and accessibility - includes "security" in our brains, even if the desire for coherence forces us to act contrary to our best interests. For example, many studies have shown that people who do not think highly of themselves are more likely to interact with people who also think of them. It may sound strange to you, but people with low self-esteem are more likely to quit their jobs when their salaries rise over time. They mentally do not admit that they can be appreciated and rewarded. After all, it is more logical when employees with healthy self-esteem are more likely to quit their jobs when wages are not growing.

We are comfortable with the familiar and the interconnected, and through this we continue to see ourselves the same way as we saw in childhood. How we were perceived in childhood, then, in adulthood, we use to predict how we will be perceived today, as well as how we deserve to be treated. For its part, information that challenges such familiar, and therefore “coherent” views, can be perceived as dangerous and disorienting even when it is not and when it needs to be revised in a new light.

Fear of success or fear of approval can lead to self-sabotage, including failure, laziness, and the destruction of seemingly healthy relationships because we, you see, "don't deserve it." We can hurt ourselves for the sake of coherence, when we stay in a hopeless job, allow ourselves to be drawn into family dramas, and so on.

Initially, we did not choose such a reaction in the form of self-sabotage - it was just that the circumstances developed. But this will continue until we get off the hook of the desire for the familiar and, with the help of emotional flexibility, turn off the autopilot, isolate ourselves from the process, go beyond the boundaries and begin to lead our own lives.

For many, a familiar and comfortable identity that keeps them hooked, especially in times of stress. It is a consequence of their path, the path to the past. But the best path of emotional flexibility means an end to the old-world zeal (which narrowly and naively characterized their "I"), and the strengthening of meanings based on actions that correspond to mature values, aligned with immediate needs.

The article appeared thanks to the book "Emotional Agility" by Susan David

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