When We Focus A Lot On Avoiding Something, That's When We Go Straight For It
- Feb 5, 2024
- 3 min read
Written by: Rossella Tocco, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
We are often so focused on our obstacles that we don't know how to define what we want to achieve. Do you know your goal, the one you like? Or even when you visualize the finish line, do you come to terms with the obstacles to overcome?
When you must overtake someone in the car, you look straight at the road ahead, right? On the other hand, if you were to look at the car you are overtaking, you would go straight into the obstacle.
Even in life, the solution is to focus positively only on what you want and not on the obstacles to avoid.
Can you formulate your goal by saying what you want, rather than what you don't want?
Start reframing your thoughts and expressing them positively.
Example: It's not worth the effort – it's worth it for me to get results by applying myself.
Example: I can't lose weight without dieting – I can work on my thoughts to eat only when my stomach needs it.
The SAR, the reticular activation system, is the gateway between our conscious and unconscious minds.
The conscious, rational part chooses the goal. The unconscious mind is the one that chooses how to behave to achieve it.
The good news is that we can program with full control which messages to send to the behavioral mind via the SAR.
This is because the SAR cannot distinguish between real events and only imagined events and tends to believe that everything the attention focuses on is true.
Like when you are moved by a movie, you are just imagining and watching, yet you are thrilled or jumping in your chair in fear!
Take, for example, the player who mentally rehearses his perfect shot before playing a game. It has been proven that the athlete achieves better results if he has added the pre-visualization of victory to the physical training.
That's why in coaching sessions I tell you that when you decide on your goal you also want to create a very well-defined representation, with images, sounds, sensations, tastes, and smells. At that point, the SAR transmits this representation to the unconscious, which already believes it to be true and adopts the consequent behaviors.
When something goes well in our lives, we easily take credit for it, but when it goes wrong, we tend to blame it on bad luck or someone around us who may have influenced us.
You know when you say, "I was so calm, I was following my diet well, unfortunately, this dinner invitation ruined my plans, or “I was serene and with this problem at home or on the ballot now I don't have to commit to cooking a healthy dinner!”
If we take responsibility for how we got to where we are today, we are in the cause. By living in the cause and taking responsibility for what happens to us, we stop feeling overwhelmed by events.
Take for example those people who are always happy, have severe problems, and yet are happy. How do they do it?
Often those who want to solve a problem, expect everything to turn in the right direction to feel good or believe that they cannot change things.
Those who live in the cause act and are in control, those who live in the effect make excuses or look for a magic solution that solves the problems.
Rossella Tocco, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
After graduating in law, Rossella continued to deal with people and practiced as a civil lawyer for 13 years. She attended postgraduate specialization courses in Coaching at the International University Center of Arezzo, she became a Practitioner, Master and NLP Trainer, also working internationally as a Coach and Trainer. She is accredited by ICF as a Master Certified Coach.
