How To Stop Unfavourable Behaviours

If you want to stop a behaviour that is unfavourable, you must first understand why you’re engaging in that behaviour to begin with. How many times have you said to yourself, “I need to stop seeking the approval of others”, or, “I need to be more assertive”, or, “I need to learn how to start setting boundaries” ?

Chances are, you made the vow to stop a particular behaviour only to catch yourself engaging in that same behaviour a few hours later.

The thing about behaviour is, the more we engage in them, the more automatic they become. If we look at the nature of behaviour, we will find that behaviours are a result of emotion, and emotion are a result of thought.

So then, in order to change a behaviour, we must change the emotion, or emotional response we experience after a particular pattern of thought has taken place. In order to get to the root cause of behaviour, you want to look at the thought patterns that are provoking this behaviour.

For instance, you want to stop seeking approval from others. Seeking approval is the behaviour, but what are the cognitive aspects that underlie your approval seeking behaviours? — do you think you’re not good enough? Do you fear abandonment? Do you believe you’re not worthy of love and acceptance?

You see, there’s much more to a behaviour than meets the eye, and only until you get to the root cause of this behaviour, it will be too difficult to change with your conscious thinking.

These thoughts run unconsciously and they rule behaviour, so therefore behaviour is largely an unconscious act.

The only way to change this is by investigating the cognitive (thinking) and affective (emotional) causes for why you behave the way you do, and then changing these thoughts and emotions in accordance with how you want to behave.