Supercoach - Michael Neill [31]
Here’s one of my favorite exercises for demonstrating to yourself that when you let go of trying so hard to get it right, you already know what to do:
Think of a decision you’d like to make. It can be as seemingly inconsequential as where you’ll have lunch today or as important as which person you’ll marry or which career path you’ll take. You’re going to make this decision in the next 60 seconds.
Now, take out a coin and decide which of your options corresponds to “heads” and which to “tails.”
Ready?
In a moment, I’m going to ask you to flip the coin. If it lands heads, you’re going to take option A, and if it lands tails, you’re going to take option B. Before I do that, you have to promise to abide by the decision of the universe, as signified by the coin flip. . . .
(Just for fun, before we go any further, which way do you hope it lands, heads [option A] or tails [option B]?)
Okay, the moment of truth has arrived. Take a deep breath, flip the coin, and see which way your life has landed.
(Quick question for you: How do you feel about that? Relieved? Excited? Disappointed?)
Here’s the secret: if you played along, you almost certainly experienced a physical, visceral response to the flip of the coin. The way you felt before the coin was flipped and the way you felt afterward are fantastic access points to your inner wisdom.
Remember, it doesn’t matter which way the coin landed. The feeling you have while it’s in the air and the feeling after it lands will tell you all you need to know.
Confabulation and “Satisficing”
“Perfection [as parents] is not within the grasp
of ordinary human beings. . . . But it is quite
possible to be a good enough parent.”
— from A Good Enough Parent, by Bruno Bettelheim
The dictionary definition of the word confabulation as a psychological term is as follows:
“To fill in gaps in one’s memory with
fabrications that one believes to be facts.”
In other words, to “confabulate” is to make up plausible-sounding reasons for our often completely irrational decisions and actions. If you’ve ever watched a stage hypnosis show, you’ve probably seen the volunteers explaining quite rationally to the hypnotist why they were dancing like Mick Jagger or kissing a broomstick. That is confabulation in action!
Here’s the problem with confabulation: when we confabulate (make up) “very good reasons” why we behave in the ways that we do, we’re setting ourselves up for a fall. This is because the decisions we make, actions we take, and moods we find ourselves in are often based on little more than an unconscious reaction triggered by an unnoticed stimulus.
In Jonathan Haidt’s wonderful book The Happiness Hypothesis, he cites numerous studies that show the power of these hidden triggers. As he says:
. . . exposure to words related to the elderly makes people walk more slowly; words related to professors make people smarter at the game of Trivial Pursuit; and words related to soccer hooligans make people dumber.
Yet when asked, people will explain away these changes with far more rational-sounding explanations, like “I’m walking more slowly because I’m tired today,” or “I did so well at Trivial Pursuit because I drew easy cards.”
The simple truth is, we’re designed in such a way that our unconscious programming drives our behavior. When our “rational” thinking mind steps in, it’s more often to justify our actions than it is to steer the ship. This is one of the primary principles behind most forms of social influence and persuasion, be it in advertising, sales, marketing, or even psychology. (Do you really believe that “a diamond is a girl’s best friend”? If you do, do you think you were born believing that?)
When we’re willing to simply trust ourselves and follow our instinct without confabulating a series of “really good reasons” for what we’ve decided, we have a gentle rule of thumb for making decisions with impunity:
The number of reasons you have to do
something is inversely proportional to how
much you actually want to do it.
Since our reasons can’t be trusted,