We all talk to ourselves, a lot. And we are very persuasive.

Wouldn’t it be great if we could just click our fingers and change some aspect of our lives? Would it be great? Where would the fun be in that? Okay, so there would be a load of fun to be had (not all of it legal or even condonable). The problem is that, well you can’t really do that. Especially when it comes to managing those intrusive thoughts. The things that we let unsettle and distract us. So, what do we change?

If only it was that easy

This is the tricky bit. We are generally extremely poor at analysing our own mental performance to any sort of useful level. We will berate ourselves based on outcomes. We say things to ourselves along the lines of “I made an absolute mess of that because” and then insert whatever we were thinking right before the wheels fell off. Or maybe we felt we were not thinking at all? We don’t give any thought to how we arrived in that state.

How we think is a habit. We may not like it but we are all creatures of habit when it comes to our mind. How we observe and react to our thoughts is a personal habit unique to the individual. The driving force behind this is our own subconscious. This means that you may not be aware of the root of the decisions you are making.

I am sure you will have had an instant where with the benefit of time/hindsight, you would have taken different actions. If you have ever been in any sort of long-term relationship, you will be reminded constantly about such occasions with the added information that other options were made aware to you. You use self-talk like “If I just had a moment to think I would have done” so and so.

Well say a big hello to your mental autopilot. There it is waving to you from your subconscious mind. Now if you read up on the concept of mental autopilot you will see it’s getting something of a bad press. This is a shame because without it we couldn’t function as we do.

I’ll go into more depth about our autopilot in the future but for now let’s just say that, with a little bit of help, we can get to understand how to work with our autopilot. It really is rooting for us. It wants to help us in the best possible way it can and if we want to change our mental habits then we have to negotiate with it.

So, what do we change? Well, a good start could be checking out your autopilot. What’s it up to? And don’t forget to thank your partner for the helpful reminders.