When you’re watching a football match, or any sports on television, you hear the commentary in the background. The commentary or the audio is just about one to three seconds behind what’s visually happening (the video).
The commentator is describing what’s happening by seeing the visuals and then commenting on what he or she sees.
It turns out that our minds also work in a similar manner. A chemical reaction occurs first inside our body, and just a fraction of a second later, a physical action occurs. And then another fraction of a second later the voice in our head speaks out, justifying what just happened.
So when you’re on a diet and go grab that piece of cake and put it straight into your mouth, something inside your head says, “I’m hungry.”
The chemical craving for a sugary treat occurred first, the physical action of eating it occurred next. And then the thought or the inner voice just gave a narrative or commentary of what just happened.
Daniel Dennett, a well-known writer and cognitive scientist, explains this wonderfully well in his many TED Talks.
What’s more important is that the narrative that happens after something has occurred is always biased to justify the thing that happened. The voice that says “I’m hungry” always tries to justify the physical response that occurred. The bias is due to our inner design—it is how we are built.
Understanding this cognitive connection between the chemical change, the physical action, and the narrative that happens after, helps us control our actions immensely.
This includes when you get angry, or when you are unhappy about something, or when you are being negative, or hating someone, or angrily honking at the car in front of you.
All these are physical actions happening a few milliseconds after the chemical change in your mind. And then there is the narrative and the commentary that justifies what happened.
To control the physical action, you can try changing the narrative in your mind. After you get angry, immediately control the narrative in your head by telling yourself “the negative action following your anger was unnecessary”—rather than a justifying narrative that says “he or she did this wrong, so I got angry.”
Stopping the chemical change might be difficult, but changing the narrative after the incident occurs is far easier and effective in controlling future actions in similar situations.
Want to stop displaying a particular behavior? Try changing the narrative in your head to a more positive one. The negative behavioral action will change with routine—all thanks to our cognitive design!