#Finding Success in 2025

Happy New Year everyone. I’m sure that no-one was waiting with bated breath for the next issue of ‘Metacognition in Practice’, but I’m glad to be back after time off with the family and trying to shift whichever nasty bug laid us up over the holiday period. I know that many of you have had the same experience, so hope that everyone is now on the mend, and able to feel positive about what 2025 will bring.

We could of course all sit with our fingers crossed and hope that this year will be a good one, then wait to see what happens. Living by default (accepting what life throws at you), often proves a disappointment however, because we're not consciously controlling the direction our life is taking. Some do attempt to take more control, by making ‘resolutions’, but, as we’ve all found, they’re difficult to stick to, despite everyone’s best intentions.

The difficulty doesn’t lie with not having the right circumstances or a lack of willpower, but rather, both problem and solution can be found inside our own heads. When we resolve to ‘do’ something differently in order to achieve an improved result, we are attempting to change our previous actions, which is a great starting point, but not enough on its own.

What we often overlook is that those previous actions became habits in the first place due to personal choices made some time ago, and are just as likely to be based on some unconscious bias, as they are a conscious decision. So, when searching for improvement, it’s no good focusing on the action itself, but rather, we have to go back to the ‘thinking’ that led to us doing things that way in the first place.

Not as tricky as it sounds if you take into account that ‘metacognition’ is a skill implanted into the human brain for this very purpose. We have the ability to recognise when the results we wanted aren’t materialising, and take responsibility for the lack of success.

This is important, because if you start blaming other people, your environment, or your circumstances, you turn yourself into a victim and will never achieve the results you really want. Taking responsibility sends an important message to your brain that it’s time to change the way you think, in order to improve the results you're experiencing.

Working out the ‘how’ can be a challenge, but there’s often more than one route to success. Take the time to analyse your options carefully, before choosing one that makes the most sense to you personally. Be careful what you’re basing your decision on, as some people are still unconsciously trying to do or be what other people want for them, rather than acknowledging the reality of their own thought processes.

Success in any endeavour is only possible if we are prepared to think in a metacognitive way. Self-reflective questions are your friends in all of this. Why have I been thinking this way? What have been the contributing factors to my attitude in this situation? What needs to change? What are my options? How can I make that work? Don't ever make this about other people, it really is all about you!

The whole purpose of metacognition is to allow personal improvement, so we obviously have to be open to change! In the same way as someone who places blame elsewhere when things go wrong, the person who wants things to be different, but doesn't initiate the change required, will also not be successful. Do you know someone who constantly talks about doing things differently and yet unconsciously protects the status quo by never taking any of those actions?

I would encourage you, when thinking about what you want to achieve in 2025, that you take responsibility for everything that happens, good, bad or indifferent, and check that you are actually open to change. If a bit of honest self-reflection throws up that you have an issue in either of these areas, then use the metacognitive process to work out why, so that you can shift that unconscious bias and move forwards.

Success means different things to different people, but it’s usually achieved via incremental improvements that come from self-reflection. That mental journey is fuelled by the metacognitive process, which allows us to keep analysing any personal ‘results’ for useful data that might help re-adjust our thinking. Changing our thoughts, in turn precipitates different attitudes and actions that will support the improvement we’re looking for

I hope that you will all find joy in employing ‘metacognition’ to help achieve your hopes and dreams in 2025.

Warm regards

Liz