There is one thing that the human psyche values above else. More than pleasure, more than comfort, more than even survival. In fact, the psyche easily sacrifices all of it for the sake of this single, most important thing.
I’m talking, of course, about familiarity. The psyche seeks out familiarity and sacrifices everything for its sake.
The person who was brought up to think he’s a loser and a misfit will keep recreating the situations that will help him experience a familiar feeling of failure. An alcoholic will detest the pain, the guilt and the shame of a hangover, but she will keep recreating them because they are familiar and have accompanied her throughout her entire life. A person who grew up believing he is worthless will have suicidal tendencies because the need to prove the familiar vision of self is stronger than self-preservation.
It’s useless to tell an addict, an anxious or a depressive person, or the fan of catastrophic scenarios to get over themselves and stop. Their behavior is driven by the most potent force inside them.
This is why it is not enough to understand the root of the problem and create healthy structures instead of the familiar unhealthy ones. The new, healthy structures have to become familiar in order for the psyche to accept them. If one spent the first 30 years of one’s life recreating the familiar misery and pain, they can’t be expected to let go of these experiences and slide easily into happiness. In fact, happiness and health might prove too disturbing and painful.
It is horribly unfair that, of all things, familiarity should be what we seek with dogged determination. But it is what it is. The very first step one can make is identify the patterns in one’s life and try to explain them in terms of seeking familiar experiences one has been having since early childhood. The patterns can be both positive a negative. The goal is, of course, to leave the positive familiar structures in place and demolish the poisonous ones.
Clarissa's Blog 
This makes a lot of sense to me. I want to lose weight right now, but food has been my go-to item for so long that it’s hard to figure out how to change the paradigm. Depressed? Eat. Happy? Eat. Celebration? Eat. Bored? Eat. When I was healthier and losing weight a dozen years ago, I pretty much stopped going out for meals and treated food like an inconvenient necessity. I lost 115 lbs that way. Of course, I’ve regained about 90 of that. I wish it were like smoking. I can just quit doing that. I can’t quit eating. But I know I can quit eating as much. It’s just that food is the most familiar thing for me, and I struggle to figure out another way to be comforted/comfortable. This is surely a lack of willpower. Sigh…
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No, no, not willpower. Willpower is another word for masochism. If I may quote myself on the subject: https://clarissasblog.com/2013/08/12/willpower-or-masochism/
And more: https://clarissasblog.com/2014/01/24/answering-questions-laziness-and-willpower/
“I wish it were like smoking. I can just quit doing that.”
– And then quit it again. And again. Every smoker I know is in the endless process of quitting because the whole point is not actually smoking as much as failing and failing and failing to quit. And re-experiencing the feeling of failure.
I also can’t lose weight. And now I need to figure out what it is I’m gaining psychologically from being stuck at this weight because nothing else will move me past it. I can’t go to the gym more than 6 times a week nor can I eat less than I already do. So it has to be something else. I will share the results of there are any. 🙂
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About weight, there are these plateaus in the weight loss process, the weights that are particularly stable, that our bodies really like to stay at. If you want to go down, what helps is varying your gym routine to include more weights, which revs up the metabolism. And, of course, a lot of patience!
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Well, you’re right about quitting smoking. I smoked for years, then quit, then started again, then quit again, … etc. Until finally, almost two years ago, I was smoking, and I had what can only be described as an asthma-style attack. I rushed home, put myself on my children’s nebulizer with asthma meds, and nearly died. I haven’t smoked since. There have been times when I’ve been tempted, but having felt the actual fear of death, I decided it wasn’t worth it to even have one cigarette more. Ever. So that’s good, I guess.
I think that what I gain psychologically from being overweight is this: when I was younger, a lot of guys didn’t want to date me because I was overweight. So I internalized this rejection and made it spread across my life. If I perceive that people don’t like me, it’s clearly because of my weight. It couldn’t possibly be because I don’t share any common interests with a person. Or if I fail to get a job, it’s clearly because of people’s prejudices against fat people. Or if I fail at a task, it’s because I’m just not as good as others because I’m fat. See? It’s my scapegoat. And yet, I’ve gotten a job; I’ve had success. So really, I think I need to let go of this go-to excuse and try to get healthy. At this point in my life, it’s not about looking good — which would have been my motivation 20 years ago. Now, it’s about being healthy enough to watch my kids grow up, and small enough to fit on an airplane or in a theater seat without feeling self-conscious.
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“So really, I think I need to let go of this go-to excuse and try to get healthy.”
– I think you can do it. You are very brave, you have weathered many difficult things already.
“There have been times when I’ve been tempted, but having felt the actual fear of death, I decided it wasn’t worth it to even have one cigarette more. Ever. So that’s good, I guess.”
– That’s a huge feat. Congratulations!
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I completely agree with your theory except for the survival part. The reason why our mind prefers a routine as opposed to something new is because evaluating and adapting to new environments and actions is a resource consuming activity. It’s stressful and requires hormones to be activated and energy to be consumed. This is something that is not sustainable for long and is therefore key to our survival: our uppermost function/instinct.
Regarding weight loss is best to focus on changing you body composition as it is simpler than actively trying to lose weight.
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Human beings have killed as buried their instincts a long time ago. An alcoholic, a smoker, an anorexic, a drug addict, a reckless driver, a soldier, a criminal – and I could I on forever – know they are risking their lives but they don’t care. And then there are those who actually omit suicide.
You’re right about lack of energy to change but it isn’t physical energy. It’s psychic energy. A suicidal person has tons of it but it’s channeled into a negative direction.
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Our instinct is not buried. Our nature It’s there all the time i.e. it constantly avoids any stress, you feel hungry, cold etc… It’s obviously not something conscious, it doesn’t know that addiction can kill you.
Regarding energy I speak of physical energy. Every time that you’re conscious, that you calculate, you consume a large amount of energy. Have you noticed how tired are you are after a stressful day? after an accident? after being in a different environment?
The same kind of energy is spent the whole time you’re consciously trying to break a pattern (i.e. addiction, bad habit).
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And by the way, this is obviously not my theory. I only wish. 🙂
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To a certain degree it is, as you’re formulating a a concoction of ideas from different sources. You deserve some credit 🙂
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Yes, you are right! Let’s give credit to me because I’ve been down on myself lately.
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I do agree with this, that the physiology of the body also has a lot to say in the matter and that we are naturally conservative in relation to our existing habits and patterns which have proven to more or less work. Change is incredibly stressful on the physiology, unless we are making changes that are already emotionally well-prepared for.
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I think what you say makes a lot of sense. There are certain behaviors I indulge in that are clearly not good for me but I still keep at them. The thing is, I’m not sure ‘figuring it out’ leads to much except for the intellectual rush one feels after solving a puzzle. Many a times I’ve just patted myself in the back for understanding the motivations behind my actions, and then…nothing.
The key is not to focus on ‘why do I do these things’ but on ‘what do I need to do to get out of this pattern’. I do a lot of the former but too little of the latter. Any advice?
Love this topic, and I wish you talked about it a lot more.
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I’m glad this isn’t boring and I will continue then.
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Agreed. Great topic. Overall I have become FASCINATEd with the power of habit and routine of late. Basically if we put systems (aka routines) into place for business, personal life, relationships etc. we will be successful. If not we place a HUGE burden on ourselves to change.
Piggy-backing on what you said about willpower. I do belive to a limited degree there is such a thing as willpower. However, on a broader scale the way to change is not to have to make a hard decision 10 out of 10 times, it is automate stuff so you don’t have to make a hard decision but 1 out of 10 times (and rely upon “will power” that one time). for example, don’t try to convince yourself not to eat the ice cream in the fridge every night…. just have the willpower to not buy it when you are at the store. If you don’t change your environment everything else won’t change.
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Yes, it is crucial to create healthy routines or structures instead of the bad ones. It is also important to remember that heathy unfamiliar structures will create a lot of anxiety at first and there need to be ways to assuage the anxiety.
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BTW.. haven’t commented here in a while.. think I need to add it back into my routine 🙂 One of the main reasons being I am one of the most honest / blunt people I know… and am very opinionated. You are perhaps the same and even more so than me. I will add you back into my life 🙂 (as semi-creepy as that may sound).
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No, not creepy at all. I know you mean it in a good sense. 🙂
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This all prompts a longish question from me. I think that weight (within reasonable parameters) is like hair or eye color– a symptom of genetics. Weight can be controlled more than hair or skin color of course and it goes without saying that there are times when mental pathology interferes with a healthy weight; however, overall, I think that genes largely control bodily structures and appearance.
In my opinion, thinness has (to some extent) become falsely equated with health. For me personally, I feel healthier when I’m a bit heavier. When I was at my thinnest weight, I wasn’t particularly healthy. I wasn’t scarily thin by any means but I was in the “ideal” weight range for my body. I was also extremely stressed out, plagued by insomnia, and sick all the time (nothing serious but I had strep throat, bronchitis, then strep throat again, than a sinus infection, then laryngitis… all in about six months. It was a symphony of illness.) Finally, I limped to the end of the school year, relaxed, slept, did lots of self care, got my head “on straight,” regained my happiness, and gained about 15 pounds. (I’m 5’5 and went from 140 pounds to 155 pounds.) Since that time, I’m back to myself: rarely sick, energetic, eating healthy, walking/running daily etc.
So judging by my own body, weight is a false barometer and I personally choose not to determine my health solely by “medical metrics.” (Also I’m not a loony. I believe in vaccinations and such!) I just am not sure that 15 pounds should determine my “medical health”…. especially if I get sick less at this weight! 🙂
This is a long way of asking: do you think genetics play a role in weight and body composition at all? If not, do you think that all psychologically healthy people should be the “ideal weight” from the health charts? Am I deluding myself that I feel healthier 15 pounds heavier? I realize that you aren’t judgmental like that. I’m just curious to hear your thoughts about health and weight. 🙂
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That last comment is from Evelina Anville. I think I forgot so sign my name. 🙂
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I think that people who carry some extra weight over the ideal can be very healthy. According to weight charts, though, I am more than 100 pounds over an ideal weight. I can’t do the things I want to do, and I’m also worried that I will get type 2 diabetes. So I think in order to be healthy, I definitely need to lose weight. Being 20 or so pounds overweight is not the same as being 120 pounds overweight.
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Yes, exactly. And diabetes is such a nasty thing that it is definitely worth making efforts to avoid it. My doctors are shocked that I didn’t get type 2 diabetes after my gestational diabetes but I’m working like a dog on lowering my blood sugar. If there is any chance to avoid this horrible disease, it has to be done.
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Yes, I think genes have a huge impact on weight. I know, for instance, that I will never be thin because nobody ever was in the family. This makes me happy because I don’t like thinness and find it unattractive.
The doctor says that the ideal weight for me is 130 lbs. I’m 5’6. I find the idea completely ridiculous because I haven’t had that weight since I started puberty nor do I ever want to have it. I’m like you in the sense that I know my body well and I know what my ideal weight is. And it’s a long way away from these bizarre medical recommendations.
If we are talking about mature, intelligent women (like you and Fie and me), I believe we know what the healthy weight is for us because we are self-aware and not into self-delusion of the “weighing 300 lbs is totally healthy” variety.
My criterion of being overweight is not based on any medical charts. It’s based on whether weight starts making some simple physical activities harder. If tying shoelaces, putting on underwear, bending, etc becomes an activity you notice and have to make efforts to complete, there is a problem.
I don’t know why this topic makes me verbose but I believe you made the absolutely correct decision to forget about the weird medical charts and go with what feels healthy to you.
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This is from Evelina Anville. I think I signed in wrong somehow last time. 🙂
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