Tag Archives: avoidance

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Consequences

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Managing behavior based on consequences is a widely used approach.  The concept relies on fear as a motivator.  That is, behave accordingly or suffer.

Intuitively we believe fear has urgency and can drive behavioral change.   In some cases this true but often through the process of rationalization, we mitigate the fear and thus are not motivated to alter our behavior.

Rationalization

When advised, “stop smoking, it will kill you” many people consider and develop a fear defense by focusing on the positive.  Smoking might kill others but it won’t kill me.

A number of psychology studies conducted on cigarette package warnings (fear tactic) are all conclusive that these warnings have no impact on smokers’ behavior.

It is human nature to focus on the positive, that is things that make us feel good and avoid scary and unpleasant things as much as possible.

For Example

A neat example of this is investor behavior.  A recent analytic study compared investment account log-ins over a five year period with reported market highs and lows (based on the S&P 500 index).

High markets corresponded with high log-ins and low markets with a low volume of balance checking.  Basically, when the news is bad we just don’t want to know, classic avoidance.

Motivating Change

The bottom line, positive behavior changes are best motivated by instant reward, fact-based analysis, comparison and competitive incentive (others are doing it so I should too) NOT consequences.

When you want to make a change, or you would like to help someone else change, remember to focus on the positive, reward them (or yourself) at the moment and consider the fact-based analysis and what others are doing.

 

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

I am not perfect

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I made a mistake earlier this month which has had some negative impacts on others.  My visions of being perfect exploded like a balloon popping, sudden and loud.

The reality is having all the required or desirable capabilities, qualities, or characteristics to be as good as it is possible to be probably still is not perfect.

Embrace Imperfection

Being perfect or imperfect and all points in-between is simply a reality of life.  In fact, this variation from getting everything right to suffering from all going wrong is what keeps me alive.

Stress challenges forging ahead against all costs is what makes living a wonderful and enjoyable experience.  My own vision of perfection includes making mistakes.

And I love it.

Celebrate Failure

The potential for failure is a key part of everything we do and it is always a possibility.  Taking the chance that leads to failure is a good thing so while it sounds strange, acknowledging the attempt, even celebrating it, might be worthwhile.

For me, perfection is planning and executing for success. This is a valid goal while avoiding failure is not.   Restated the road to success does not mean the chance of making a mistake is to be avoided.

Without mistakes we cannot succeed.  Perfection is not without blemish but that is as it should be.  I do all I can to reduce the risk of making mistakes, but I do not avoid them at the expense of learning, striving and undertaking challenges.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Frustration

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Most of us experience a strong feeling of annoyance or upset because of a strong believe you lack the ability to change or achieve something, from time to time.

This sense of frustration typically  occurs for example when a doctor keeps you waiting past your scheduled appointment perhaps even one or two hours.
Or maybe you are in a line to make a purchase and you have been waiting an hour.  Whatever you are buying it must really be something  to make it worth the wait.

Avoiding Frustration

Being frustration rarely results in good behaviour.  Unfortunately many of us our known to pass along our frustrations to others in loud, sharp and disrespectful ways.

I believe this to be a strong argument to avoid things that can lead to frustration.

This is not always easy and does require some planning but it is a good approach not only for you but particularly for the others whom might become innocent victims of your negative emotions at some point along the way.

Selecting Options

Most of the common causes of frustration relate to other people.  How dare they make appointments, shop and drive at the same time as me.

This can be overcome by simple steps like picking the first appointment of the day to avoid later delays, driving at timesoutside rush hour and picking shopping hours that few others do.

The benefit of being relaxed and happy while you full-fill your needs without frustration will become quickly apparent.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Surprise!

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The catch all definition for a surprise is “an unexpected or astonishing event.”    This is a bit simplistic because the magnitude of surprise can vary depending on how impactful the event is, whether is negative or positive and how unexpected it was. (But they all are surprises)

For example, the people living in earthquake prone geographic regions will express surprise when an earthquake occurs, even though it is not truly unexpected.

The moment in time, the magnitude of the earthquake and the results can be somewhat predicted but not with pin point accuracy and the surprise people feel at time of occurance is not unexpected in that context.

Ignore and Hope

Old age is more likely to produce strokes, heart attacks and other negative impacts.  Yet, for many, the signs are ignored to some extent and hopeful ignorance reigns supreme (I will live a long time).  When the physical event occurs it is often a surprise (to some degree anyway).

Wishing negative surprises do not occur is a very natural human behaviour and can be a good stress reliever.  Why worry about something that might occur?  Better to assume it will not.

Pragmatically for the inevitable negative surprises that will come our way acting like an ostrich has some merit  (e.g., death and taxes – although some are not surprised by their taxes).

Predict or Accept

An interesting question for me around the approach to surprises is should we try to predict and worry or just accept them when they occur and move on.

Clearly there is probably not an absolute here.   On one hand, worry can lead to mitigation and real avoidance but it can be unpleasant as well.  On the other hand, acceptance is not always easy to do.