This post is part of a series about raising your self-awareness to facilitate long-term behavior change. See the previous post for an explanation about how to mentally rehearse behavior change to make it easier to adopt in the moment
So far we’ve talked about mentally rehearsing a behavior before it happens in order to boost our awareness. Remember, more awareness means more change, more quickly, and more stickily (yes, it’s a word). This is because when we’re aware of what we’re doing, we can make intentional decisions about our behavior. To quote Victor Frankl / Steven Covey: “In between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
Most of the time, however, we don’t notice ‘the space between stimulus and response.’ I call this being on autopilot – it’s how we behave without really needing to think or be intentional. Autopilot is our default mode – most people are on autopilot most of the time (here’s some science about that). And that’s perfectly normal – it’s a way our brain tries to keep us safe. But when we want to change our behavior, we need to temporarily turn off autopilot.
Mentally rehearsing before the fact makes it easier to expand that space between stimulus (what’s happening out there) and response (what we do about it). I like to call this space a wedge of awareness. With practice, we learn to insert that wedge to get us out of autopilot. Here’s an illustration –
So when we know we’re in a situation where opportunities to practice our target behavior will come up, being extra mindful of what’s going on will help us spot the opportunity, insert a wedge of awareness, and make the change in real time. But even if we don’t catch it in real time, just the act of turning up our awareness in those moments will make it easier for us to catch it in the next moment.
Additionally, it’s easy to get caught up in thinking we’ve missed our chance. But I like to encourage people to try things even when we think it’s too late. Going back to our self-advocacy example from the previous post – let’s say you’re in that meeting with your boss, and before you know it, you’ve only got 2 minutes left. With practice, your internal dialogue might look like this:
Ah shit, I’ve already blown it. I can’t believe I missed my chance again. I’m such a loser.
*inserts wedge of awareness*
Oh! I’m judging myself again. I’m also thinking self-defeating thoughts. Let me give it a shot, even it’s not the perfect time.
“Hey boss, I know we don’t have time to talk through this right now, but I want to bring it up and we can dig into it later. I’m really wanting a raise…”
This might be awkward, but in my experience the awkwardness can actually help. It can motivate you to catch it sooner next time. And also empower you by helping you realize that awkwardness does not need to stop you.
Practicing behavior change in the moment is most difficult, and requires the most self-compassion. You’re not going to catch it every time, but catching it every time is not a realistic expectation. Nor is it a useful goal. A far more useful goal is to practice being aware, even if it’s after the fact. Noticing that you behaved without as much intention as you would have liked, and doing your best not to beat yourself up about it. The better you get at noticing this, the more often you will perform the desired behavior and forego the undesired behavior.
I like to think of awareness based behavior change in terms of probabilities. The more awareness you have, the more probable it becomes that you will do the desired behavior instead of the undesired one. No matter how much you practice certain skills, you’ll never be perfect. But you can increase the probability that your behavior will be effective.
As you can see from this expertly crafted graph, both before and after practice there’s a spectrum of effective / desirable behavior. And sometimes your worst performance after practice might not be as effective as your best performance before practice. But on average, you’ll be more effective with practice.
Every instance to practice your new behavior has unique internal and external factors largely outside of your control – internally, you may be in a bad mood, or have not slept the previous night. Or externally, your company might be having a salary freeze, which will make it more difficult to actually get the raise you’re asking for. So rather than getting caught up in trying to achieve a specific outcome right away, try to focus on the process of long term growth, which inevitably will include missed opportunities, failure, and disappointment. Try to focus on how your practice of this skill is moving you towards a more meaningful life.
In summary – in order to intentionally change your behavior, try to be aware of what you’re doing in the moment. Turn off autopilot. And then do the thing that will move you toward developing your desired skill / behavior change. Don’t get caught up in perfectionism or not attaining outcomes which are outside of your control. Even if you think you missed your opportunity, try the behavior anyways.
(cockpit painting above by Jeremy Couillard)