6 Ways Your Brain Attempts To Sabotage Your Goals & Dreams
Well this article here explains the 6 ways that your brain plays tricks on you to sabotage your goals and dreams.
1.) Your brain can hurt your goals by fantasizing too much
Would you believe that fantasizing is the #1 way your brain can unintentionally ruin your goals?
It seems unlikely, right?
The thing is, the proof is in the pudding (or in this case, the research): psychologists have found that while positive thinking about the future is broadly beneficial, too much fantasy can have disastrous results on achieving goals.
Researchers tracked the progress of how people cope with four different types of challenges.
As an example, in one of those challenges (trying to find a fulfilling job), those who had spent the most time fantasizing performed the worst in a variety of critical data points:
- they had applied for fewer jobs
- they had been offered fewer jobs
- if they were able to find work, they had lower salaries.
Why?
Why could fantasizing about a positive end take a turn for the worse?
Jeremy Dean, a psychological researcher at UCL London and the owner of PsyBlog had this to say about the researcherâs conclusions:
The problem with positive fantasies is that they allow us to anticipate success in the here and now. However, they donât alert us to the problems we are likely to face along the way and can leave us with less motivationâafter all, it feels like weâve already reached our goal.
Itâs one way in which our minds own brilliance lets us down. Because itâs so amazing at simulating our achievement of future events, it can actually undermine our attempts to achieve those goals in reality.
Our poor brain is thus a victim of itself.
Again, this is not to say that visualizing goals is necessarily a haphazard strategy for achieving them, itâs just that we need to be aware of the dangers of excessive fantasy.
Instead of being entranced with what the future may bring, we need to learn to love the work here and now.
Enjoying our day by day progress and realistic âcheckpointsâ is a much more practical way to create our future; getting lost in grandiose dreams that focus on the ultimate end is not.
As they say, donât give up on your dreams, but donât fall under their spell either.
2.) Your brain procrastinates on big projects by visualizing the worst parts
Procrastination, of all of the things on this list, is likely the most recognizable: everybody realizes that they procrastinate from time to time, and itâs something we are forced to battle with every day.
How can we fight this persistent opponent?
Interesting research from Russian psychologist Bluma Zeigarnik (of whom the Zeigarnik Effect is named after) reveals to us an interesting tidbit about the human mind: we are better at remember things that are partially done.
Ms. Zeigarnik came to this conclusion by testing the memory of folks doing simple âbrainâ tasks like puzzles or crafts.
She then interrupted them and asked them to recall (with specific detail) the tasks that they were doing or had completed.
She found that people were twice as likely to recall more detail about the tasks they had been interrupted in than in the tasks they had completed.
What does this have to do with procrastination?
Before we get to that, know this: in a study by Kenneth McGraw, participants were given a very tricky puzzle to solve with an âunlimitedâ amount of time.
The thing is, all of the participants were interrupted before they could finish, and then told that the study was over.
Guess what happened nextâŚ
Despite being told they were done, nearly 90% of participants continued working on the puzzle anyway.
What both of these studies teach us is that when people finally manage to start something, they are much more inclined to remember the task and finish it.
The Zeigarnik Effect and the subsequent McGraw study assure us that the best way to beat procrastination is to start somewhereâŚÂ anywhere.
Our brain has the habit of envisioning the impending huge workload of an upcoming task.
It also tends to focus on the most difficult parts or sections, and this is where procrastination begins to set in: as we try to avoid the âhard workâ, we find ways to skate around it and trick ourselves into thinking that weâre busy.
Just starting though, triggers our brain in a different way.
Itâs the same way that cliffhangers are utilized to keep us coming back to our favorite TV shows; weâre primed to remember the last episode because the story was interrupted, and our brain wants a conclusion.
Itâs the same with your tasks:Â start, and your brain will overcome the first hurdle.
This seemingly small milestone appears to be the most important one to overcome if you wish to defeat procrastination.
After starting a task, your brain will be more enticed to finish it to itâs âconclusion.â
You also tend to see that itâs not as big a mountain as you initially imagined, and that the work involved in completing this task wonât be so terrifying after all.
3.) Your brain will âabandon shipâ at the first sign of distress
Anyone whoâs fought the good fight with dieting will likely recognize this phenomenon.
Envision this:
Youâre on a diet, and have been doing well for about 2 1/2 weeks, but you know your defenses are at risk.
To make matters work, youâre having dinner with friends tonight.
Instead of the healthy meal you could have made at home, youâre forced to use a restaurant menu.
The problem is this:Â At the bar before dinner, you had a little âcheatâ moment by ordering snacks and drinks, after all, youâre with your pals tonight, right?
You know that those drinks and snacks, combined with the bread you had before dinner, leave you with one option to stay a bit over your caloric intake goals: you must eat a salad.
The thing is, your brain is yelling out âBURGER!â.
Instead of finishing the day a tad over your 2000 calorie goal, you order the burger with fries and donât look back.
The crazy thing about this scenario?
Itâs much more than a momentary act of weakness: psychologists have observed that this is much more likely to happen as a result of you missing a previously set goal.
Specifically, in research by Janet Polivy and her colleagues, people who were actually on diets were tested with pizza and cookies.
In the study, two groups of participants (those on diets and those not dieting) were told not to eat beforehand and then served exactly the same slice of pizza when they arrived to the lab.
Afterwards, they were then asked to taste and rate some cookies (Iâm getting hungry already : )).
The thing was, the experimenters didnât really care about the cookieâs rating, they just wanted to see how many people ate.
This is because they tricked some of the participants into thinking that they had received a larger slice than the others (using framing and false information). This was to make them believe that they had most certainly âruinedâ their diet goals for the day.
The result?
When the cookies were weighed, it turned out that those who were on a diet and thought theyâd blown their limit ate more of the cookies than those who werenât on a diet.
This doesnât paint the true picture though:Â they ate over 50% more!
On the flip side, the dieters that did think that they were in their caloric limit ate the same amount of cookies as those who werenât on a diet at all.
Truly, our brain is geared towards a call of âAbandon ship!â, whenever we come short of our goals.
Donât let this happen to you!
The best way to combat your brain from signaling âMission Abort!â after youâve missed a short-term goal is to re-frame what just happened.
Yes, you did fall short or maybe mess up this time, but remember the progress that youâve made.
With the diet example, you could look at all of the âgood daysâ youâve accumulated thus far: even if you fell after only a few days of starting your new diet, itâs still an accomplishment to have started one and to have set long-term goals for yourself.
Short-term lapses in your end-goal is not like a bad apple spoiling the bunch: you have gotten things accomplished so far and you need to stay focused on the long-term, not become distraught by a single mishap.
Research tells us that this is the best mindset to take for misfortune and failure in general: your progress and achievements go so much farther than that slip-up; donât let your brain convince you that all is lost!
4.) Your brain loves mindless busywork disguised as progress
How fitting that this should be posted on a site that relates to social media!
One of the ways in which your brain continues itâs trickery is through busy work: work that gets âsomethingâ done, but not something that produces any measurable results.
In fact, research by John Bargh and colleagues reveals that our brain just loves to become robotic and to even mimic people out of habit.
I shouldnât have to tell you that this is disastrous to achieving long-term goals!
This busy work is often a mechanism our brain uses in cohesion with avoiding big projects (mentioned above): instead of diving into the difficult tasks we KNOW we should get done, weâll instead float around doing semi-related (read: barely related) menial tasks to make ourselves feelproductive without actually getting anything done.
Hereâs the thing: youâre not going to build a thriving business or a successful blog with that kind of busy work.
It takes doing the hard work and it takes deliberate practice, thereâs no way around it.
The thing is, your brain knows this, thatâs why you have to remind it remind yourself that the challenging stuff is often the stuff that produces the results you desire.
Also remember that you can fight that procrastination by just getting started.
When you look back at what youâve gotten done by the end of the day, make sure youâre proud of what you got accomplished, donât let your brain ruin your goals by diverting you from what needs to be done!
5.) Your brain gives you a false sense of time.
Your brain says:Â âRelax, youâve got plenty of time for this project.â
The reality:Â You are straight-up terrible at estimating how long it will take you to finish tasks. Youâll almost assuredly underestimate the time youâll need.
When they started building the Sydney Opera House, the blokes in charge were all like, âNo worries, mate. Sheâll be done by 1963 and this $7 million budget should cover things nicely. Throw another shrimp on the barbie.â (Note: I am paraphrasing here.) Then they proceeded to tear through the $7 million faster than a kangaroo chasing a boomerang (fun with stereotypes!). The iconic building finally opened in 1973âten years late and $95 million over budget.
You tend to underestimate how much time projects will take for you to complete. Itâs called Planning Fallacy, and itâs why Afternoon-You looks at the to-do list made by Morning-You and says, âWere you under the impression that I am some sort of goddamn superhero or what?â
Psychologists think your overly optimistic planning is caused by a combination of wishful thinking and how you view similar projects youâve done in the past, which is to say you subconsciously take credit for the progress that was made but blame outside forces for delays. The last article took so long to write because your computer crashed, your neighbor was playing âRhythm Is A Dancerâ on his damned guitar again, and you got stuck in traffic on the way to an interview. Those things werenât your fault and wonât happen again, you say. But they might. And if they donât, other time-sucks will show up to take their place.
Solutions:
- Your brain isnât as bad at determining how long it will take someone else to complete a task. Youâll overestimate in most cases, but itâs nothing compared to the wildly overoptimistic standards youâll set for yourself. When you need to determine a time frame for a project, imagine someone else will be completing the task and your guess will be closer to the truth.
- Planning Fallacy is going to tell you that writing your book will take, oh, maybe two weeks if you stop for meals. As always, it lies. For a goal as complex as that, the only way to get a remotely accurate estimate is to break it into the individual steps it will take to achieve it. Besides, itâs scary as hell to see âwrite novelâ on todayâs to-do list, but breaking it down into steps like âresearch alpaca breeding standards for bookâ or âwrite chapter sevenâ turns it into something thatâs finite, specific, and easier to wrap your head around. Make a list. Write down how long each step will take. Add âem up.
- Make a note of how long similar tasks have taken, but donât adjust for distractions or problems caused by outside sources.
- Identify potential snags. Assume theyâll happen.
6.) Your brain is not good at âwinging itâ when it comes to planning⌠ever!
Every night before I go to sleep, I like to write a simple âto-doâ list that I group into two categories.
I put some in category âAâ (must be done tomorrow) and some in category âBâ (must be worked on or done in 2-3 days).
I do this because when I sit down at the computer to do work without a plan, I tend to fall flat on my face.
My so-called âwork timeâ turns into the not-so-productive âcheck email timeâ or âbrowse Redditâ time; nothing of any importance gets done.
It seems that Iâm not alone!
In research by Gollwitzer and colleagues, the subject of âif-thenâ plans was discussed in relation to how we set and stay consistent with out goals, and the results are not surprising but reveal a lot of insight into how our brain reacts to planning (and even some great tips).
The thing is, researchers found that not only do well laid plans seem to get accomplished more often, but planning for failures along the way (âIn case of emergencyâŚâ) helps people stay on task under duress.
Letâs continue our diet example from above.
Say you did have that lapse and go over your calories for the day.
Instead of âwinging itâ and letting your brain crumble to itâs likely response (discussed above), you should have a backup plan ready to know what to do when failure strikes.
This could be something like: âIf I go over 2000 calories in a day, Iâll finish the day as close to 2000 as I can, and then the next morning, Iâll go for a 15 minute run as a âpenanceâ, make sure I eat an extra healthy breakfast, and then continue the rest of my day as normal.â
You are likely no stranger to feeling ashamed about getting off track, weâve all been there.
Having those âIn case of emergencyâŚâ plans help us to have a game plan in case we do falter, and including a small âpenanceâ like I discussed above can help us get over it quicker.
If you failed on your diet for a day and then âpunishâ (again, just with a quick run) yourself by running in the morning, you can go about your day knowing that you got what you deserved, instead of sliding down the slippery slope of guilt through the rest of the day.
So remember to include an âIf-Thenâ plan for your next big goal, youâll be able to beat back your brainâs guilt over slipping up now and then and you wonât have to ever âwing itâ in case something goes wrong!
And here is a bonus little meme from the good fellas over at Runt Of The Web that I am sure we can all relate to:
This is an article by Gregory Ciotti, founder of Sparring Mind.
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