Behaviours, Actions and Habits

When we want to pursue an efficient mastery process, it is essential that certain undesirable behaviours, actions or habits should be addressed and either adapted, changed, tweaked or refined to achieve what we wish to accomplish.

For Example…

• To be more, or less, socially outgoing.
• Improving friendships and/or family relationships.
• Reduce excessive worries, anger, obsessions and/or jealousies.
• Be more compassionate by being more caring, giving, empathic, sensitive or affectionate.
• Stop bad habits and addictions such as… smoking, drinking, drugs, biting nails, overeating or swearing, etc.
• Overcome behavioural problems such as… lying, stealing, deceiving, dominating or controlling others, manipulation, bullying or laziness.
• Learn, study or work more productively by gaining more self-discipline, self-control and procrastinating less.

Guiding questions…

• What actions, behaviours or thought patterns need to be tweaked, adapted, improved or changed to achieve desired outcomes?
• How did the behaviour and/or action get started in the first place?
• Why has the behaviour and/or action persisted, despite different efforts to change it?
• What are the main reasons – if any – for changing or adapting these behaviours and/or actions?
• Is this behaviour and/or action generally present, or does it only surface under specific circumstances and conditions?
• What kind of negative influences does the behaviour and/or action have?
• What kind of positive influences does the behaviour and/or action have?
• What will you – personally – gain from actually changing these behaviours and actions?

Use the answers to the above questions to define and describe the behaviour, action or habit as follows…

1. Cue: What tends to trigger the behaviour, action or habit?
2. Routine: What normally happens when the habit gets triggered?
3. Reward: What are the payoffs[mfn]Please, bear in mind that payoffs should include both the positive and the negative, not merely the one or the other… because in reality “you win some, you lose some” and when you do not accommodate both sides of the coin, chances are good that you will develop and sustain an unhealthy contextual understanding of the behaviour. Therefore, overall, what most often is the outcome? Productive or unproductive, what are the short, medium and long-term consequences? Because there often are short-term beneficial payoffs, but – in the long run – are quite harmful to sustaining a harmonious environmental fit, and vice versa.[/mfn] from continuing with this habit?