Do you breathe before you answer that call you didn't want to receive? Every time you go to work, they ask you if you're angry even if you're not?. If you pay attention to how you function as a person, you've really been doing it as a robot, programmed by no one but yourself. Now that you know, you can start changing it.
Did you know that more than 90% of human behavior works on autopilot? This is because our neural connections are behind all our habits, and it is in their function to create small 'shortcuts' that allow us to live and function in the best and easiest way in this world. These actions that work by default in the body are those that make us fall back on certain actions or thoughts before we realize them.
Living or being in a state of mindfulness allows us to recognize when we release control of our mind to the autopilot. We enter more into executive control over our mind and what we do, allowing ourselves much more intentional actions and decisions. This is what comes as a result of much practice, meditation, and entering this state.
Our conscious is very different from the subconscious, in fact what we have and are comes from a series of results that the second has produced. Even if you don't want it, your autopilot is working with full constancy, and it is the reason why we often find ourselves going through shortcuts that we have not decided to transit, those that go afloat, for example, when you arrive at a place and you did not even notice how many people you greeted before you were there.
Hence the importance of this concept: 'Behavioral Design'. It's the way you really put yourself as your ship's sole pilot and leave the auto off. To create this state you can do two things, the first is to slow down your thinking, put obstacles in its way, for example decide to understand all the songs that sound in your favorite playlist. The second is to remove the obstacles that you have put in the mind that you want it to be in control.
Understanding what you want to change is the first step to start designing better behavior, the second step is to start working by doing so, greatly reducing the power of the autopilot. Something you could start doing is creating conditionals (If ..., then ...) to help you alter certain patterns, for example if you wanted to change a behavior like always checking your cell phone, you would mentally think, say and do the following: If I'm going to grab my cell phone for something that is not productive, then I cross my fingers. The best thing about making these changes is that as they generate positive change, they will generate different and improved behavior.
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