I have been suggested to reward myself whenever I notice myself doing something undesirable, rather than feeling bad about the fact that I do it. Obviously, there are some actions I prefer over others, but the idea is that you do not want to punish the act of noticing something important, because it leads to a very poor incentive structure within your perception. What do I mean by that?
Imagine that someone snacks on food whenever they feel anxious. This is a rather common habit in the modern world, because food is so prevalent and is effective at making us feel better in our body, without any of the side effects of drugs or alcohol or anything which can be labeled as an addiction. The typical way that people would relate to this coping mechanism is to feel bad about the fact that they are doing it, as well as all the weight they have gained as a result of it, which prompts them to fire up some motivation to exercise and also change their diet. On the object level, they are doing the right thing because these changes obviously lead to healthier eating habits, but can those changes be implemented in practice, and do those lead to a healthier relationship to oneself? In my experience, not at all.
Many people try to force themselves to change, which creates internal conflict, and the fact that this conflict is not even acknowledged essentially guarantees that it is bound to repeat over and over. When you view the problems in your life as being the results of a lack of alignment rather than because you "haven't tried hard enough", then there is an opportunity for an internal dialogue, which has some possibility of creating alignment within yourself, as opposed to the cycle of forcing and demotivation which is habitual for most.
Punishment creates an incentive to not repeat the behavior, but deeper than that, it creates an incentive to numb the feeling which leads to the behavior. If I turn to snacking in order to feel better in my body, and I punish myself for snacking, then I also disincentivize myself from feeling all the patterns which lead to me snacking in the first place. In practice, this leads people to numb their pain away, possibly through other means, and I hardly see how that resolves the situation.
I think this is how people get stuck in some loops such as addictions. Their body-mind has developed ways to not feel things, and instead reach for something immediately. The usual way of removing the coping mechanisms does nothing whatsoever to the structures of pain and numbness which are prior to the coping mechanism.
This means that it is not just habits and thoughts which can be coping mechanisms in life, but blindness too. This is why rewarding the act of noticing is so important, and why I engaged in that roleplay dialogue with myself.
This is also why I think that life becomes harder and harder for most people as they age, besides the obvious fact that your physical health must decline at some point. School instills in them a way of self-relating which is about focusing on results and punishing the undesirable behaviors. This means that their default mode of relating to problems is to contract more and more. Over years and decades, this leads to a life filled with coping and blindness mechanisms, the former to deal with undesirable feelings, the latter to numb those entirely before they reach their awareness.
This is why personal development usually takes in the form of dissolving resistance and old patterns which aren't useful anymore. We usually have plenty of resources to thrive and deal with our problems, but when our energy feels blocked, when our attention keeps getting misdirected so as to avoid feeling certain things, and when being honest with ourselves feels uncomfortable, then suddenly, we can feel very stuck in all kinds of ways.
Our society is by and large at odds with Truth. Notice how often the messenger of bad news is the one being punished, whether it is in a company or in a family. I distinctly remember many situations as a child where I could tell that telling the truth would get me punished, whereas lying would get me out of trouble because my parents didn't care enough to examine what I said. To this day, I find myself lying to my parents about all kinds of minor things, because I do not feel comfortable being open with them.
The difficult thing is that it's not so simple to encourage someone to be open. I cannot simply say, to you or myself, "don't bullshit yourself", because that has a distrustful energy to it. Furthermore, I cannot say something as naive as "honesty helps you see things more clearly" because it would ignore all the ways in which our environments didn't allow us to be honest and follow what we want, to the point where understanding what is going on with ourselves can be surprisingly difficult.
I think the simplest prompt to start having a more honest relationship with oneself, the one that has worked for me at least, is to focus on observations rather than trying to be honest, which feels very vague when it's unfamiliar.
This is because specific observations get you more in tune with Reality, which is the place where actual problem-solving can happen. One of the common point behind all my ruts is that I get stuck in a mental space where I only describe things in vague terms because I'm still trying to emotionally process them. I start saying things such as: "I don't want to do anything", or "I hate work so much", but most of the time, I do not even have clear thoughts, I just feel very low-energy and uninterested in most things.
This is where noticing comes into play. You can notice that state, be glad that you had enough lucidity to catch that early on, and see whether you can describe what is happening in specific terms.
From that point onwards, I think it's good to separate what you want from simply what is happening. Both are important to track and express, but getting clear on whether a problem arises because there is something genuinely problematic about your situation, i.e. what is happening in your body is uncomfortable, or because you haven't been able to meet your expectations, is a good distinction to have.
Artist blocks for instance are basically always in the latter category, though they lead to physical tension and other similar tangible issues. It's not that someone "cannot" draw, it's that they feel like they cannot meet their expectations given how they currently feel, and so they are paralyzed. If your expectations for a decent drawing can be met with a doodle, you would find that there is little resistance, because the main conflict lies in what you want.
There is a lot more to say but I think it's a good place to stop. I think the dialogue with myself I did is a good practice to keep up regularly with in my life. In particular, what I noticed was that it's important to express my frustration and anger in some fashion, learn to understand it, and channel that energy into actionable steps. The following has almost become a cliché but it's worth saying again and again, that anger and other emotions we do not like expressing are very important to bring up, otherwise they sit below the surface and lead to all kinds of problems, in my case a sense of being numb.
Go back to the list of blog posts
Distraction Attention Incentives Ifs Blindness Loadbearing Habits Schooling
2025-08-26