Start to see the problem
The titanic sunk when it hit an iceberg, the iceberg wasn’t seen until it was too late and then as the story goes nothing could stop the catastrophe that followed. The thing is with icebergs is that they are hard to see and that’s because 90% of an iceberg’s mass is hidden under the water, this is what makes icebergs so dangerous, and this is why our cognitive biases are so dangerous too. So bear with me whilst I explain this in a little more detail.
In life, we make our everyday decisions based on our memories, beliefs, values and the way we see the world. Most of our decision making is unconscious it happens under the surface, and we don’t even consciously notice we are making most of these decisions. Sometimes the decisions we make are the right ones, but sometimes when we get things wrong and we make really bad decisions too.
Most of the decisions we make in life are automatic, they are unconscious processes that cause us to do what we do, but if these thinking patterns is wrong using the iceberg metaphor we can effectively have our own personal icebergs under the surface of our consciousness driven by our instincts habits, feelings, our perceptions, expectations, and our core beliefs that all affect how we think without us really knowing, ready to scupper us at any time.
For most of the time just like the Captain of the Titanic, we don’t see these icebergs coming and using this analogy we also don’t always see what is going on under the surface until the ship has effectively been sunk. I want to alert you to these ways of thinking that are harmful to you to so that you can see the problems coming and help you to navigate safely around these potential disasters in your life too.
I’m going to ask you this when was the last time you didn’t know what to do?
The worrying thing is most of us think we already know what to do most of the time, but this doesn’t always guarantee we are making the right decisions. In fact, psychologists and sociologists will tell us that most of our behaviour is predictable, and it’s only when we are aware of what’s under the surface that we can finally gain the insight to think more critically about our lives.
I want to help you to change your thinking to help you see and navigate the problems that you can’t yet see.
