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Frustrating distractions acting like a security blanket
Episode 112
Hidden ways that you're subconscious can distract you from doing what's really important. Penny here. I'm back with another episode of Design Your Destiny. And a few weeks ago I mentioned that I would talk about distractions. Now, sometimes distractions are pretty obvious and other times they are not. But before I explain more about what these distractions can look like, I would like to share with you where they come from. Our brain is always processing information, whether we're consciously aware of it or not. Our mind is processing millions of bits of data per second. And there's a part of our brain called the limbic system in the amygdala is a part of this network, or it's connected to it. Your amygdala, as I've shared with you before, is a part of the brain. It's the size of an almond sliver that determines our state of wellbeing. We're safe and secure, or we are in danger. Something is pleasant or it's not pleasant. A situation may be fair or unfair. It is this part of our brain that plays a major role in activating or sending a signal that results in the activation of the fight or flight response, which most people now know is the fight, flight, freeze, or fawn response.
[00:02:41] When that response gets activated it can be on a continuum. It can be very mild feelings or for someone who experiences severe anxiety and panic attacks, it could feel like a full blown panic attack or a rage attack, right? Or a severe freeze response. So it's on a continuum. It's not black and white. There are many, many, many shades of gray of what this looks like. When we are going through our day and we're not mindful of our body and what we're feeling and what we're thinking the amygdala can alert that there is something we are experiencing that is unpleasant. We could be anticipating a meeting with a boss, or we're gonna be connecting with a family member that the last time we spoke, maybe it wasn't an enjoyable experience. Maybe there's absolutely nothing happening that we're aware of, but the subconscious mind has picked up on something as simple as a change in the tone of conversation in a room and in the past that change, a tone and conversation preceded something that ended up being an unpleasant experience, or just maybe something that was unenjoyable. I think it's very important that I highlight that, that it doesn't have to be something awful or terrible to trigger this. It can just be something that's not enjoyable, not pleasant.
[00:04:21] When our subconscious mind interprets something and puts meaning on it, and our conscious mind has not yet perceived it, the subconscious mind can generate this activation of fight or flight in our body. It then begins to perceive the changes in the body. Maybe our heart rate picks up a little bit, or we feel a little tense, whatever it is that may happen, and then the brain goes, oh, we don't like when our body feels this way. So then we distract ourselves away. The subconscious mind goes, Oh, we're really not gonna like this, so let's keep this off of, i'll just do this as if it was me, we will keep this off of Penny's attention. So what might happen, say for instance, I had a call that I had to get on and I was not sure what the call was about. I'm not talking a sales call, but just, something that wasn't planned, and I have to make this call and I'm curious what the person is wanting to connect with me about. In the part of my brain, maybe, Oh, we don't want to think about this. We don't like this. Let's send Penny down the rabbit hole. And maybe there was productive work that I needed to do that's focused, but now my brain is like, Oh, you know what? The other day I was thinking about this domain name. Let me look up this domain. and then I see that the domain name is available. It's like, Oh, geez, I wonder if anybody's ever written a book by this name. So I go down this rabbit hole of doing a bunch of stuff that is not productive. It is not helpful, but it is entertain
Published on 3 years ago