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is also likely to make you a less attractive person to yourself too. When this happens things can easily fall apart – damaging you, psychologically and/or physically, and your life in many areas. The trouble is that even at this stage people often do not see the incoherences within themselves and cannot see in themselves what is plain to others. A fresh start (perhaps a new partner, or a new job) will not do the trick because habit will do all it can to keep them doing more of what they did before. Unless these incoherences are resolved the old issues will resurface. The Do Something Different techniques are aimed at helping people see and remove any incoherence.

50. Coherence units

Most decisions and actions we take are complex, although they may not appear so. To break this complexity down a little we might think of situations as being made up of different units of thought and action. So, for example, having dinner is likely to include units to do with eating, but also with travel (going to buy the food or getting to a restaurant), as well as others such as relationships (eating with people) and so on. A unit is something that has a goal or an end (eating for satiety, relationship for social function, etc.).

This means that we can describe lack of coherence as arising from two different sources:

Incoherence within a unit, such as when a person says they are going to do something, apparently intend to, but then do something else. For example, a person wants to lose weight and intends to diet but cannot resist the chocolate when offered.

Incoherence between units, such as when there is a clear intention for a person to diet but this is at odds with an invitation to friends for a slap-up dinner. The doing of the one unit (to do with eating) is, for many practical reasons, incompatible with the doing of the other (to do with relationships).

So, to include units within the definition, coherence is the alignment of all levels, or of all units within a complex situation, to the same goal or end.

51. Apparent and real incoherence

Earlier we suggested that incoherence always has negative consequences, although in fact it may be sensible to appear to be incoherent in certain situations or contexts. We said that being incoherent always leads to some negative outcome. This does not mean that a person would never appear to be incoherent. It is necessary to distinguish real incoherence from apparent incoherence. So far we have been discussing only real incoherence. Sometimes circumstances may require us to act in a certain way that belies our feelings: to appear to agree with a view, for example. This would not count as incoherence because it is both:

deliberate and

determined by the goal of the unit

For example, if your partner asks you ‘Do I look good in this?’ it may be coherent to say yes (even if you don’t think so) because you know they are feeling particularly sensitive for some reason, or to avoid making a snap negative judgement because you recognise that your own taste needs developing.

Imagine you have accepted an important or long-standing dinner invitation from someone you’ve been longing to get together with. But you have also just started on a strict diet and know the meal will be a hearty one. It may still be coherent to go along and enjoy the meal, if the goal was to spend time with the person who matters to you. This isn’t a lack of willpower or a weakness. The original intention to diet remains but has undergone rational reconsideration as a result of your ability to flex. However, if you stayed in instead and couldn’t resist a pack of doughnuts you found in the cupboard that would not be coherent.

Real stage and film acting presents us with an interesting side-issue in relation to coherence and its importance in how others view the authenticity of behaviour. No one would assume, for example, that an actor taking the part of a nasty war commander was showing incoherence even if the actor were an extreme pacifist in real life.

One acting technique some directors employ is ‘method