Psycho-Cybernetics, Habits, and Change For The Better
This is the 5th blog in a 10-blog series about Habits, doing New Things, and Change.
Dr Maxwell Maltz wrote
Psycho-Cybernetics in 1960. Dr Maltz was a plastic surgeon who noticed the huge impact self-image has on people's lives. He wrote about people who had experienced facial injuries and been scarred. Some facial scars ruined lives. Some facial scars were worn like medals of honour. Dr Maltz became a pioneer in psychology when he recognized the injury itself wasn't the problem. How the person viewed himself after the injury was the important thing. North American men who had suffered facial injuries often developed a negative self-image…became depressed, etc…and, as an example, failed to be able to sell as well as they were able to sell before the injury. Meanwhile, Spanish men gained prestige when their faces were injured in sword duels. Dr Maltz wrote about numerous other examples where people's self-images caused problems like anorexia, paranoia, obsessive-compulsive disorder, depression, etc.
While that may sound like the stuff psychologists and medical doctors will or should figure out, it isn't restricted to those sciences.
People are people and self-image problems can wreak havoc with people's lives…including their worklife. Small self-image problems can cause major difficulties in the form of firmly set Bad Habits and resistance to change.
People have habits, some good, some not.
Here's how Dr Maltz described Dr Knight Dunlap's study of habits and learning processes:
His experiments proved that the best way to break a habit is to form a clear mental image of the
desired end result, and to practice without effort toward reaching that goal.
Here is some advice from Dr Maltz:
…by arranging things so that we can succeed in little things, we can build an
atmosphere of success which will carry over into larger undertakings.
Dr Maltz created 'mental exercises' to help people remove Bad Habits [like worry and negative thinking] by replacing them with Good Habits [like confidence and courage]. We can employ these techniques when we work on Change For The Better. Many sales-training courses use these types of techniques.
Here's a Maltz excerpt, part of his instruction on how to get out of a Bad Habit rut:
Go back in memory and relive those successful experiences. In your imagination revive
the entire picture in as much detail as you can. In your mind's eye "see" not only
speech, business deal, golf tournament, or whatever, that accompanied your success.
What sounds were there? What about your environment?...
The next blog in this series will present a practical tool - the MotivAider® - for Change.