Book | Series 12: Changing Human Behaviour

Description

The course teaches you about how to change behaviour. We explore our current approach to changing behaviour and explain why it fails. By understanding the factor that causes our current approach to fail, we can simply do the opposite and uncover the approach that succeeds.

INTRODUCTION

This series focuses on human behaviour, specifically how to change human behaviour. The series discusses observation as a tool to facilitate behavioural change.

The Premise:

• The observation of our behaviour is a learning about our behaviour that transforms our behaviour.

Our behaviour is a reaction.

Example:

• Anger is a behaviour. It takes place in response to an experience.
• Anxiety is a behaviour. It takes place in response to an experience.

By observing the cause, experience and consequence of our various reactions, we are able to formulate a general understanding of human behaviour and, at the same time, develop a unique understanding of our specific idiosyncrasy as a human.

The observation of ourselves results in a general understanding that comprehends the commonality of mankind, and a specialised understanding that comprehends our unique variants of common problems.

Explanation: ‘our unique variant of common problems’

Anxiety is a common problem, and it effects people in much the same way, however, each person has a unique condition that produces that anxiety. The condition, being unique, can only be resolved by a solution that is similarly unique. This means, the solution can only come through the unique experience offered by the observation of my own anxiety.

Example:

NOTE: the example uses speculative percentages

While 95% of Person-A’s anxiety is common, the other 5% makes it unique. It is not possible to clear up the 95% of the anxiety with a common method and leave the other 5% intact. The solution to anxiety requires a total solution and, thus, a unique solution, otherwise the anxiety persists.

• A generic approach to changing anxiety is like pruning a bush. The pruning modifies the bush but, over time, the branches grow back, just in a modified form.

Only the observation of my unique experience of anxiety can transform the anxiety I experience.

In this series we discuss our current approach to changing human behaviour and why it has failed. We propose a new approach to changing human behaviour that utilises the immediate perception of the problem.