As a part of an overall approach to personal growth, it’s important to know when your mind – which is far more complex than many of us give it credit – is working on your behalf and when it isn’t.  Or, to put it more specifically, when it thinks it’s working on your behalf… when in reality it’s doing the equivalent of tying your hands behind your back so you can’t hurt yourself… but can’t eat or drink either!

In so many ways, our minds have adapted almost too well over millennia.  In an effort to protect us in the short-term, we can frequently be hurting ourselves over the long haul.

The self-serving bias is like that.  It’s the tendency to see ourselves as responsible for our successes, but to see others – or the circumstances – as responsible for our failures. 

This is so clearly a coping strategy – we do this to protect our self-image, improve our confidence, and keep ourselves from dwelling on the negative.  We also do it to (at least seemingly) protect the image of ourselves in the eyes of others by playing up the good stuff and deferring blame for the bad stuff.

But is it healthy?  Is that really who we strive to be?  Someone who takes the credit and assigns blame?

I doubt it.  Most of us would probably say that this doesn’t describe us at all.  That we’re great about giving credit where it’s due and taking blame when things don’t go well.  And of course, most of us would be kidding ourselves (there’s that damn bias again).  Because who you think you are and who you actually are are rarely the same.  That’s one of the core tenets of psychology.

Not a day goes by that you don’t witness the self-serving bias in action if you’re actively looking for it.  In sports, you typically want to win.  So of course you’re going to believe that the umpires or referees have it out for you if you don’t.  At work, you want to be seen as someone who makes things happen.  So when they don’t, it can’t possibly be your fault, right?  And in politics, you want to be right.  So everything your candidate or party says can be seen through that lens.

Is this inevitable?  Are we doomed to demonstrate the self-serving bias whether we like it or not?  Of course not   Where would the fun in life be if we couldn’t change ourselves and become better people?

Step 1: Learn about the self-serving bias

Naturally, like many things in personal growth, the most important thing you can do is to learn about the self-serving bias.  Watch the video above, read a little bit on the web, and think about how you exhibit this in your own life. Knowing that the self-serving bias exists and that we can all be lured into its trap can help you avoid it in the future.

PsychWiki as usual has a good write-up and a list of references you can refer to.  The relationship to self-handicapping is especially interesting to me.

Step 2: Value failure and take accountability

The best way to succeed is to double your failure rate. - Bill Gates

It sounds cliché but failing is the only way to grow.  If you don’t take pride in your failures and use them as opportunities to learn and adapt, you’re handicapping your progress.  Failing is all part of the process.  Start accepting the fact that failure isn’t always someone else’s fault and start owning up to it.  The people around you will respect you more and you’ll all be able to learn from your mistakes moving forward.  Yes, it’s hard to admit you’re to blame – even partially.  But it’s critical to overcoming the self-serving bias.

Step 3: Find ways to give others credit

Taking credit for everything is something children do when they don’t know any better.  It’s far more fun to help others succeed provided you do it genuinely.  Give others an opportunity to shine even in situations that don’t seem “important”. 

Helping others grow and get recognition can have such a profound effect on you that it can outweigh any perceived benefits of taking all the credit to begin with.

Bottom line: Be aware that you probably have a tendency towards the self-serving bias.  If you find yourself exhibiting it, refer back to this post and straighten yourself out!

Related posts:

1. Going Paperless at Home in 6 Easy Steps
2. 4 Steps to Learn Any Physical Activity

Overthinking is a natural part of life for many of us, even when we’re not aware we’re doing it.  Research has shown that overthinking is prevalent in young and middle aged adults, with 73% of 25-35 year-olds identified as overthinkers.  More women (57%) find themselves overthinking than men (43%), which is a significant difference.  This means the majority of women are overthinkers, and the majority of overthinkers are women. 

I’m not a woman, but I am an overthinker.  So I guess I’m in the minority… a vocal minority   If you find yourself spending an unreasonable amount of time thinking through something, twisting it around in your head until you’ve seen it from every angle and possibility, chances are you too are an overthinker.

There are very few benefits to being an overthinker.  Being logical (and therefore unemotional) about taking action has a lot of merit and can have positive results, but there’s a difference between thinking about something just enough – and thinking about something to the point of analysis paralysis.  The short of it is, you don’t want to be an overthinker!

Overthinking can occur as a consequence of a decision that needs to be made, big or small, and is typically exacerbated in stressful situations.  It’s not limited to decision making however, as it can also rear it’s ugly head whenever something has the ability to cause any level of anxiety or worry.  It’s the proverbial thing that “keeps you up at night” and stems from an actual or perceived lack of control over some aspect of life.  With a lack of control comes a feeling of helplessness. Overthinking is frequently the direct result.  The worst overthinkers actually spend time overthinking seemingly meaningless things to the point that they’ve spent more time thinking about the thing than the time it would have taken to address it completely.  What a waste of time and energy!

There have been a number of studies over the past 20 years that challenge the view that overthinking equates to better decisions and therefore improved happiness and success.  Specifically these studies have found that overthinkers are more prone to sustained sadness and negative thinking.  And though it may seem that thinking through problems to the extreme would result in better decisions, overthinking has actually been shown to impair problem solving and rational thought, and interfere with initiative and motivation.

What’s worse is that people aren’t clued in to the dangers of overthinking.  Most people feel they’re making progress while cogitating endlessly, but in fact they’re permeating negative thoughts and fostering a pessimistic view of the situation.  As we know, “we are what we think”, and for those stuck in the cycle of overthinking, they’re reinforcing this adverse thought process and letting it trickle into other areas of thought.

If you got this far, chances are you’ve identified yourself as an overthinker. Which means right now you’re probably wondering what the heck you can do about it?  If you were to stop reading right now, you’d probably go off thinking that you have a problem – and then spend the rest of the week wondering how this affects your thinking, what you could do to “fix it”.  And again, you’d be overthinking it! 

Overthinking isn’t something you’re born doing, it’s a learned habit you form over time, probably as a defense mechanism to the possibility of failure.  So before going any further, let’s see what we can do about it.

If you find yourself overthinking, you need to change the channel in your mind immediately.  Simple, right?  It mostly is.  The caveat here is that while the solution is simple, putting it into action takes ongoing practice.  But just like most things, the more you do this, the better you’ll get at it next time and the time after that.  Here are some ways you can change your current thought process:

1. Avoid situations and people that can lead to overthinking.  You can do this based on history – you can probably determine which situations are going to keep you up at night unnecessarily.  Or do this based on how something makes you feel prior to participating.  This takes some self-awareness, but it isn’t unlike what an alcoholic has to do in order to stay sober.  They avoid the people, places, and things that put them into that mental state.
2. Talk to yourself.  Rather, don’t talk to yourself in the way you’ve been talking to yourself; “level up” your self-talk.  When you have something on your mind and you can’t shake it, stay aware of your thought process… You may find it surprising how often the topic pops up.  You may also be surprised to find that overthinking is more likely to occur with negative thoughts, which means you’re fixating on the wrong things to help you overcome the situation.  Every time you find yourself overthinking something, especially when it’s negative, think instead, “This isn’t helping.  What would help is…” and replace it with a positive affirmation.  Do this each and every time.
3. Commit to a project that maps to your goals.  Find a happy person and chances are you’ll find at least one active project that aligns with their core values.  If you’re able to focus your energy on something that matters to you instead of on the repetitive monotony of unhelpfulness, you may find yourself thinking less and less about the thing you want to avoid.
4. Distract yourself.  Get out, do something, and get your mind off of the thing you can’t stop thinking about.  It’s possible to do this… you just have to be willing to give it a shot, which is probably the trickiest part (convincing yourself to do it).  The best way I’ve found to distract myself is to exercise – for whatever reason it’s hard for me to overthink when I’m sweating – but spending time with your family, going on a drive, or just sitting still and breathing work as well.  The best distractions are ones in which you can find the flow state.  Find your favorite distraction and do it!
5. Enforce a time limit to your thinking and document your thoughts.  If you’re going to overthink, just commit to it for a short amount of time.  Give yourself permission to overthink, but only for 15 minutes.  Set a timer, grab a pen and paper, and for the entire 15 minutes, write down everything that comes to your mind.  Don’t stop to correct yourself (pretend there’s no eraser or backspace key), it doesn’t matter what you’re writing.  You’re just letting yourself get it all out.  When the 15 minutes are up, crumple up the paper and throw it out (or safely burn it) and move onto something else.  Something fun.
6. Turn overthinking into a next action in a project plan.  One big reason for overthinking is not knowing what comes next in order to make forward progress.  When you consider that overthinking is usually endless unstructured thinking on something, the key is to turn that energy into structured thinking.  Determining what the next possible action is you could take in order to push the boulder another inch up the mountain could free you from thinking about everything else at once.  Crystallize your thoughts into a list of next actions and take the first step.  Add the next to your calendar or to-do list, and know that you’re making progress.
7. Realize that being perfect isn’t possible.  Striving for perfection is a recipe for disaster, and the sooner you give up those perfectionist tendencies, the sooner you’ll move past the thing that’s occupying all your thoughts.  Perfectionism is highly overrated, and this post lists the 11 reasons why!
8. Work through the 5 keys to overcome fear.  The most important one for overthinkers is to stop projecting the worst of what could happen.  Ask yourself what’s the absolute worst that could possibly happen – and then be OK with that outcome, coming up with appropriate responses if necessary.  This is an amazingly freeing step as almost immediately, a light bulb in your head goes off.  If the worst case scenario isn’t actually that bad, and if you know how you’d deal with it if it came to that, anxiety about that thing may disappear completely.
9. Think about the big picture.  This is the one that has worked the best for me over the past few years.  It takes a little experience (i.e. the know-how to realize that it will indeed pass) but if you ask yourself, “Will this matter in a month/6 months/1 year?” and the answer is “No” or “Not really”, then what’s the point in thinking it to death?  If you do, in fact, determine that it will matter in a year, you can use this opportunity to leverage post-traumatic growth.  How has this experience changed you?  What have you learned from it, or how will you approach it differently next time?

Overthinking is a real detriment to focus and must be stamped out.  Forming positive habits and reinforcing them over time will make a big difference in your propensity to overthink, and these steps are some ways in which you can start to do that.  Let me know how it works!

(One way I’ve stopped overthinking and trying to perfect this post is to close my laptop without rereading it and get outside – it’s Sunday afternoon.  I’ll read it once more in the morning and then post it.)

Related posts:

1. 15 Ways To Get a New Habit To Stick Forever
2. Always Late? Stop Living in Time Denial
3. 5 Keys to Overcome Your Fear

Time perspective is about how we subjectively divide the flow of human experience into time zones or categories.  We each create segments of reality through time using significant (or sometimes insignificant) events in our lives.  Zimbardo calls this “subjective time” because it’s highly personal and unique to each of us.  The way we approach time in general varies quite a bit and can easily become a bias as we’ll see.

The famous longitudinal marshmallow study, referenced in just about every positive psychology book these days, is a great example of how time orientation has an effect on who we are and what we do.  If you haven’t heard about the study, it involved a group of 4-year olds who were given a marshmallow as a reward for completing a task.  The kids were told that if they could hold off and not eat the marshmallow once left alone, they would receive another marshmallow.  Of course, more kids than not couldn’t wait and ate the first marshmallow.  They wanted instant gratification over delayed gratification, even though there would have been a better outcome through waiting.

When these kids graduated high school, they were interviewed by the researchers and there were significant differences across the board.  The kids who were able to delay gratification and hold off eating the first marshmallow scored 250 points higher on the SAT and had far more positive personality traits than those who gave into the impulse.  They were self-motivated, decisive, self-confident, and balanced.  It pays to embrace delayed gratification.

If you’re interested, you can read more on the marshmallow study before going further.

This strangely reminds me of Vanilla Sky, an otherwise lame-duck movie except for the description Tom Cruise’s character uses to describe his perspective on time: I’m a pleasure delayer.”  I’ve always liked that.

Zimbardo talks about three groups of people: present, past, or future-oriented.  Naturally people can’t really be 100% in any given orientation, but it’s possible to have a strong leaning.  Present oriented people make decisions based on what’s happening around them at that present moment – how things taste, look, feel, or impact them at that time.  Past oriented people make decisions based on what’s happened before or on what they know or have seen or heard.  Future oriented people are focused on what will be – always doing the cost/benefit analysis against their actions.  All of us have some bias based on how we look at time – this bias influences all of our decisions even when we’re not aware of it – and most of the time, we’re not.

Now, generally it’s believed to be healthier to lean towards future-focus rather than present or past focus.  People who are future oriented inherently avoid risky behavior and gravitate towards healthy activities: exercise, dental checkups, eating healthily, and so on.  They usually don’t drink excessively, do drugs, or smoke.  A joint study done at Stanford and Cornell with 1200 students showed that the more present-oriented you are, the more you use alcohol and engage in risky driving behavior.  This behavior can be justified through a “you only live once” mentality, which to present-oriented people means “the future isn’t as important as the present”.

Zimbardo then breaks time orientation down further into 6 distinct profiles:

• Past positive.  View of one’s past is generally positive.
• Past negative.  View of one’s past is generally negative.
• Present hedonistic.  Where we all start in life!  Focused on the joys of life right now.
• Present fatalistic.  Things don’t matter, your life is out of your control.
• Future goal oriented.  Working towards overall goals.
• Future transcendental.  Life begins after death.

Given these definitions, the target profile according to Zimbardo is:

• Moderately high on past positives
• Moderately high on future goal oriented
• Moderate on (a “dash” of) present hedonism
• Low on past negative and present fatalism

People who fit this target profile are able to view their past positively while keeping the future in focus when decisions are made, all the while occasionally indulging in activities that result in pleasure in the present.  They’re not dwelling on the negatives in their past (even though they have them just like everyone else) or taking a “this doesn’t matter anyway” approach to the present.

While this profile is ideal, you must also be able to change perspective fluidly depending on the situation.  Without the ability to move in and out of different perspectives, you’re “stuck” with a single view which can increase the bias in which that perspective has on your outlook.  For example, you need to be able to shut off your past and future perspectives at times to get things done, knowing it will bring you closer to your goals and increase the possibility of generating new positive memories.  And once you get through the grind, you can feel OK about rewarding yourself in the moment with a little chocolate

For me, time perspective hits home with respect to aging and the road of life.  My own time perspective profile maps almost exactly to the target profile above, which I’m happy about: I view the past with a lot of joy and some nostalgia.  I have many great memories with friends and family and do my best to capture them and look back on them from time to time.  I look to the future on a regular basis to map out a plan for the short and long-term, but I try not to get “stuck” there so I can be in the present moment.  And I definitely indulge in some present hedonistic activities (as I sip on a yummy cappuccino right now).

But despite this, I have a view of aging that can lead to a “good old days” mentality, indicating an occasional slip to an overemphasis on “past positive”.  All around us people talk about how getting old sucks – there’s more aches and pains and fewer simple joys in life.  In sports, the day you turn 30 all anyone talks about is how everything’s downhill from that point on.  Couple this with the perception that as you get older, life speeds up, and this can lead to a fatalistic view of the future (old age and death are rapidly approaching).  As is typically the case, I’m working to reframe my perspective using images.

My past (and occasionally current) view of aging looks more like the view as seen by those sportscasters – peak at 29 and begin the gradual decline into old age, eventually dying a frail, sad human being.

But that isn’t accurate at all.  And it’s not the kind of belief I want to cultivate in my mind.  You are what you focus on.  So I’ve decided to replace that depressing visual with something that looks more like this:

Life is a journey, not a chart!  What’s the point in believing I’ve already peaked?

So what can you do to change your perspective if you find yourself biased in one way or another?  Here are some links to posts that may (or may not!) help.

1. Plan your life with a focus on the future (this post is mostly about project management techniques)
2. Practice goal setting and refer back to your goals from time to time
3. Use productivity methods to get on top of things and free up your time
4. Indulge in pleasurable activities in moderation (what I’ve also called micro-vacations)
5. Practice being mindful and living in the moment when you can (find flow!)
6. Form new habits (and leverage neuroplasticity)
7. Look at your past through a positive lens (if it helps, takes lots of photos and videos!)

To learn more about time perspective and the psychology of time, I’d recommend checking out The Time Paradox by Philip Zimbardo and John Boyd.

Related posts:

1. Focus: How Rapt Attention Changes Who We Are
2. Precommitment: Commit in Advance to Keep Yourself On Track
3. The Self-Serving Bias: 3 Steps to Total Eradication!

We are what we repeatedly do.  Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. – Aristotle

An example of how neuroplasticity works: when you view the brains of people who frequently practice playing the violin under fMRI (functional MRI) they appear to have developed a larger area of their brain devoted to mapping their fingers.  This change is directly related to the quantity and the quality of the practice they’re performing – their brains are adapting in very real and tangible ways unbeknownst to them.

One of the fun sayings around neuroplasticity: “neurons that fire together wire together… and neurons that fire apart wire apart.”.  Effectively this means that when neurons activate at the same time as a response to an event, the neurons become associated with one another and the connections become stronger.  This is why people talk about “neural pathways being set” with respect to increased practice – the more practice you accumulate, the more ingrained or grooved the pathways become.  Of course the inverse happens as well: if those pathways aren’t utilized, the space will be used by other pathways needing room to grow. Use it or lose it!

You can picture this yourself by imagining the flow of water through sand (I’m writing this from a beach in Kauai so excuse the metaphor – but I always find a mental motion picture is worth a thousand words!)  When seawater first runs over the sand, there isn’t a path for it to follow so it starts to form one for itself.  As the water continues to flow over the sand, the pathway forms a real groove in the sand and gets deeper and more defined.  It may start to branch off and take up more room in the sand if necessary, even reforming pathways on top of pathways that are no longer in use if it needs to.  Once the pathways are formed, it becomes more difficult to change the water flow – and if the water ever stops flowing, the pathway will remain for some time in the hopes that it’ll be used again at some point.  (This is why picking something back up after some time of inactivity is easier than starting a new activity cold).

The research around neuroplasticity is burgeoning these days – many people in psychology are talking about the hows and whys around it, and over the last decade a fair amount of research has already been done on the brain and its ability to reshape itself.  It’s no longer considered a theory in brain science, it’s fact.  Up until the 1980s or early 1990s, most scientists believed that your brain developed in your early years (throughout childhood) and then became “hardened” like dried concrete.  One has to assume this is where the moniker, “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” came from.  But it turns out this just isn’t true.  You can fundamentally change your brain so long as oxygen and blood is flowing through you.  Which means you have no excuse when it comes to forming new habits.

In Tibetan Buddhism, the concept of neuralplasticity has been around for far longer than Western science has recognized it – the term for it is le-su-rung-wa which means “pliability”; your brain can change based on repeated experience. It’s no surprise then that studies have been performed on plasticity during meditation and have shown that the brain can change based purely on mental training.  This of course has huge ramifications for mental practice and its impact on overall well-being.  If you can think yourself into being more compassionate, or more positive and more resourceful, or calmer and more content, it seems a little too good to be true.  But with some effort, it’s possible.

There are a few interesting things to note about neuroplasticity.  Change takes place rather suddenly in the brain.  A recent study has shown that habits can be formed in as little as 7 days of repeated activity, but can dissipate just as easily.  In other words, change comes naturally and quickly and can disappear just as quickly as it arrived.  It also appears that “learning a variety of new things, rather than simply practicing old skills, may be most effective in terms of brain structure alterations”.  And while neuroplasticity is possible in adults, it appears that in children it’s rampant – which makes logical sense as it aligns with our overall perspective on learning.

In short: this is relevant research to all of us.  It implies that people of any age have the ability to learn new things and form new habits.  Therefore contentment (my preferred term for ‘happiness’) isn’t a state you’re born into, it’s a state you can discover.  And the sky’s the limit for the ability to learn and perfect new things throughout your life.

So what are you waiting for?

Related posts:

1. Form Positive New Habits Through Active Association
2. Guarantee Success By Tracking Your Habits with Joe’s Goals
3. 12 Goals: Define and Track Your Habits & Tasks (Step 3)