YOUR BRAIN HOLDS THE POWER OF SELF-AWARENESS

Greek philosopher Aristotle, is quoted as saying “knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom”. He sure deserves his reputation as one of the fathers of western philosophy!

Self-awareness is at the heart of the change work we perform as coaches and working at a deep level can achieve transformations in peoples’ lives. And it is useful to look at different levels of awareness, which I cover briefly in this article.

1: Self-awareness at an action, habit and behavioural level

2: Self-awareness at a mindset, belief and values level

These can be represented in the simple, familiar drawing of an iceberg as what we can see above the waterline as in number 1 above and what lies beneath – number 2.

1: Above the waterline - how aware are you of your habits?

The reality is that many of us sail through our days on auto-pilot, with little awareness of what we’re doing or why we’re doing it in the first place!

Most of our actions aren’t a result of conscious thinking but from routines and habits. You take actions because you’ve laid down the neural pathway by doing it many times before. You may have a routine for biting your tongue when concentrating or a gin and tonic routine at the end of the working day or a twice press of the snooze button in the morning. When it comes to brushing your teeth, have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered whether to select a molar or an incisor to start? Most likely not!

Research has found that more than 40% of the actions people perform each day in the same location aren’t due to making conscious decisions, but are habits. The habits lock in because your brain is following an established routine.

These routines and automated processes are strategies to free up your brain’s thinking capacity so you can focus on your goals and engage your intentional thinking. They are a natural aspect of the workings of our brains and it is a great asset to us in the way we live our lives. 

Self-awareness of these habits at work

At work, the tasks may be new each day but the way you approach them will be habitual and automatic – the way you approach a meeting, your thought process in arriving at decisions or dealing with your boss, a colleague or a team member.

I am not saying this is bad, it’s the means by which we function in a world that would otherwise overwhelm us with information. However, it can be a limiting factor if the objective is to be creative, break with the past or find new solutions.

It is in this context that a coach can work with a client to look at those limiting factors. How can they become more self-aware to identify which actions, habits, routines or behaviours aren’t serving them well? A coach will enable the client to put a voice to these habits and routines and try out new behaviours and actions that will lead to better results, clarity or confidence.

 2: Self-awareness below the waterline

The master of emotional intelligence Daniel Goleman suggested an often-cited definition of self-awareness as “knowing one’s internal states, preferences, resources and intuitions.” (1). I believe as coaches we take this further by working with clients beyond just the “knowing”. It is useful to discuss how to manage these internal states as well as identify blind spots and areas of challenge or concern. Working below the waterline helps to tap into the emotional brain and enable discussions around values, emotions, beliefs and how we sabotage ourselves.

The language of the mind

As a starting point, one of the most powerful ways of working with a coaching client to build self-awareness is to encourage a language they can identify with for their processing and thinking styles. What happens with all the information flooding into their brains every waking moment, their preferences for making sense of this information, how do they create meaning and draw conclusions?

Your unique synaptic network is like a road network

I like to explain this by using the metaphor of a road network for the unique synaptic networks in your brain.

Imagine that you have been asked to develop the road network for a new city the on the banks of the River Thames called London. Some of the major roads are already there, your job is to plan the rest.

Since you have no way of knowing how people will actually use the roads you decide to initially build all the roads the same size and then see how they are used in practice. 

If they are used frequently you will widen the roads by adding additional carriageways to increase their capacity. If they are only used a little you will leave them as they are, and those that do not get used will be dug up to make way for additional buildings or become bicycle paths.

It’s the same with the brain through its development. While they can ebb and flow and change with major life events, the preferred routes for information within the brain are laid down as your “super highways”, your “A” and “B” roads and your “bicycle paths”, which in turn determine the blend of processing styles you rely most heavily on during your life. At its simplest, your “super highways” are easier to access, with strong neural connections so you travel that road most readily.

A language for your road network

It is a challenge to bring conscious language to your unconscious actions and a coach can help a client to find a way to describe their super highways in a descriptive manner that works for them. Underpinned by neuroscientific research, the MiND model is one route, giving a descriptive language of the likely characteristics and styles that emerge from the super highways operating in different parts of the brain, such as reasoning and logic; spontaneous and holistic; feeling and emotions; specific and detailed thinking (2). A coaching discussion of course adds richness, and flavour to enable a unique blending of an individual’s road network.

The brain is like blending paints

In much the same way as the primary colours are the same for everyone but you can mix an infinite variety of different colours from them, so the synaptic network is able to mix the common processing styles of the human brain to create an infinite variety of emotions, thoughts, ideas and preferences. It is for this reason that, despite the physiological similarities of human brains, we all end up as unique individuals.

Your blind spots are your bicycle paths

It is as important to recognise your bicycle paths as well as your super highways. Neuroscientists reckon that in our busy worlds we use around only 50% of our brains. So, we will likely travel the “super highways” first and if we are lucky, the “A” roads. What therefore are we missing? A coach can help a client to understand and voice these blind spots and put strategies in place to ensure the client accesses all parts of their brain when faced with a challenge or a person whose road network is entirely different.

Unconscious to conscious awareness

And remember this all goes on at a subconscious level. By using models, metaphors and different language a coaching conversation brings this into the conscious arena, enabling self-awareness to be discussed, slowly build understanding and consolidate. Self-awareness is the conscious knowledge of what is going on both above and below the waterline.

Becoming more self-aware can help you to proactively manage your thoughts, emotions, and behaviours, rather than allowing them to manage you. It means becoming conscious of your habits and road networks so you can have more control and choice over your responses and relationships and create changes for a more fulfilling life.

What do you do to ensure you stay self-aware?

Photo by Alexander Hafemann on Unsplash

1: “Emotional Intelligence, Why it Can Matter More than IQ”, Daniel Goleman (1996), Bloomsbury Publishing

2: For more information on the MiND model, visit https://mybrain.co.uk/public/disc_your.php