Sometimes we know that something we are doing is wrong, that it doesn't benefit us, that it even harms us, but we can't stop doing it. No matter how much we are aware of it, we will behave in the same way and naturally get the same result.
If we know this is going to happen, then why can't we change our behavior? Could it be that the problem is not that we don't know what is happening, but that we don't want to look at what is happening?
Let me add a little more, could it be that we are deliberately sabotaging ourselves?
In this article, we will discuss why learning doesn't always happen; why sometimes we don't take in information and the philosophical and scientific mechanisms behind it.
Philosophical and Scientific Background
Philosophical Perspective
Socrates - Not Knowing or Knowing and Running Away?
According to Socrates, the greatest characteristic that distinguishes human beings from animals is reason, and the golden rule of using this mental capacity is to know oneself.
His call to "know thyself" is not only a quest for knowledge, but also an invitation to confrontation. Knowing oneself begins with seeing why one does what one does and through which values one lives.
But a critical tension arises here. Knowing brings with it a moral responsibility. When we see or understand something, it is difficult to pretend that we no longer see it.
Socrates' real legacy is perhaps this: Knowledge is not a relief; on the contrary, it imposes a responsibility. (1*)
Because knowing and not doing creates a conflict within us when we cannot bear this responsibility.
This conflict is often more painful than not knowing. This is why we sometimes choose to run away, not to see, or even to deceive ourselves instead of knowing, because the easiest way to avoid the tension within us is not to start it at all.
There is a direct link between knowledge and confrontation.
Knowledge puts us in front of a mirror, but we don't always want to look in it. Because what we see whispers that we must change, and change always comes at a price.
Nietzsche - The Price of Confronting Ourselves
According to Nietzsche, man's greatest battle is often fought not outside, but within himself. (2*)For to face the truth is not only to know it, but also to be able to act in accordance with it.
Oftentimes, when confronted with uncomfortable truths, our minds go on automatic defense. We choose not to see in order to protect the vulnerable part of us. This is not a passive weakness; it is often a protective reflex we develop in order to survive.
This is where the stories we tell ourselves come in. Instead of bearing the full weight of reality, these stories make it bearable. Sometimes we justify our behavior, sometimes we put the responsibility on someone else, sometimes we postpone it by saying "it's not the time yet".
This is where the price that Nietzsche points to emerges.
Facing the truth first disrupts the balance within us. To remain strong, we often choose not to see or hear for a while. But this escape waits silently at the door where we will meet the real change.
Hannah Arendt - Is Not Thinking a Choice?
Hannah Arendt sees the human capacity to think not only as a theoretical activity, but also as a moral responsibility. For her, the greatest danger is the banalization of evil or misbehaviorthrough the suspension of thought. This is a passive renunciation rather than an active evilness.
Arendt's famous "banality of evil" makes sense here: when man stops thinking about the consequences of what he does, he falls out of conscience, not only of others but also of his own conscience.(3*) Ignoring is often the result of a conscious choice. Because thinking brings responsibility; not thinking brings temporary peace of mind.
This passivity is in fact a silent affirmation. Every moment we choose not to think, we are complicit in the consequences that our actions or inaction will produce. Arendt warns: When we silence our minds by deceiving ourselves, we trivialize error or evil and unwittingly become its bearers.
At this point, from Socrates' call to "knowledge brings responsibility" to Nietzsche's warning of "the price of facing reality" to Arendt's "not thinking is a choice" determination, there is a common point.
The human mind oscillates constantly between seeing the truth and running away from it.
We understand that this running away, which is the main act of self-sabotage, is not only born out of ignorance, but most often out of the emotional burden of carrying knowledge.
Scientific Perspective
Why the Mind Escapes
The human mind demands not only to see the truth, but also to accept it. But we do not accept every invitation. Because truth often shakes our comfort zone and initiates a silent questioning of our identity. At this point, the mind puts on an invisible armor to protect itself. This armor is often called avoidance.
When what we see contradicts what we do, a subtle tension arises within us. It is as if one part of us is saying "you know that" and the other part is whispering "but you have to go on like this". This conflict triggers one of the mind's most basic defense reflexes: Bending the truth. Thus, we see things a little differently than they are; we convince ourselves. Because the truth as it is is sometimes too heavy to carry.
American social psychologist Leon Festinger is one of the most influential figures in modern social psychology. This is precisely what he called cognitive dissonance: When what we know contradicts what we do, the mind tries to find a balance by changing either behavior or perception.(4*) Oftentimes behavior is hard to change, so we stretch perception.
"It's not that big a deal," we say. "Everyone does it," we add. Thus our inner silence is maintained. But this silence is often temporary; the tension lives on somewhere deep inside.
This escape of the mind is actually a survival strategy, not a weakness. Learning is not only about receiving new information, but also about carrying the emotional burden of that information. And sometimes that burden can be so heavy that it overwhelms the inner equilibrium.
Daniel Kahneman - The Comfort-Preserving Mind
Daniel Kahneman argues that our minds often operate in a fast thinking mode to maintain comfort. (5*)
This mode is an area where automatic defenses kick in, where our unquestioning reactions dominate.
Because slow thinking, that is, carefully analyzing and questioning our existing beliefs, requires energy. Our mind, like a bodily reflex, prefers to keep out of the door information that is uncomfortable or could shake our identity.
This mechanism is actually useful in everyday life. When we brake suddenly in traffic, or when making a simple decision, quick thinking can save lives. However, the same mechanism turns into a blocking wall when we face our inner confrontations. Our mind protects our comfort zone by saying "don't see this now" because the moment we see it, responsibility begins, and change always costs energy.
Changing a habit means not only adding a new behavior, but also stopping the old behavior and overcoming internal resistance. This naturally leads the mind to choose the path that will consume the least amount of energy: Ignoring. This is why confronting the truth is often postponed; the mind chooses to remain in a protected silence.
Psychodynamic Approach
Suppression and Avoidance
The psychodynamic approach is a scientific perspective that studies the unconscious processes of the mind and their influence on our behavior. (6*)
The main scientific topic of this approach is how these unconscious defenses manage emotional burdens and shape one's behavior.
According to this perspective, our mind activates automatic defense mechanisms to protect itself when faced with uncomfortable or identity-threatening realities. The most important of these mechanisms are suppression and avoidance.
Suppression is not an act of forgetting, but of sending to the unconscious. Our mind pushes aside a reality we don't want to see as if it doesn't exist. But this does not mean that it disappears completely.
What has been pushed away continues to exist silently inside, echoing in our behavior, our choices, sometimes even in our body.
Avoidance is a more conscious attitude. When we know something is challenging us, we choose not to look at it at all, or to postpone looking at it.
This provides an apparent peace of mind; we feel as if the problem has disappeared. But what we don't see is there and reminds us from time to time.
The real function of these defenses is to help us carry the emotional burden. Because learning is not just about taking in new information, it is about facing the emotional tension that that information creates.
Compression and avoidance relieve this burden for a while, keeping our minds in balance. But in the long run, it leaves an unresolved silence inside us.
Real Problems and Solutions
The Real Problem
It's Not Not Not Learning, Not looking
The problem is not lack of knowledge or lack of motivation. Most of the time we know what we need to do; we even realize that if we take one step, our lives will change. But we still refrain from taking that step. It's not that we don't know, it's just that we avoid looking at it in the right way.
It's as if looking at it will put us in emotional debt.
It's as if facing the truth will cause a subtle jolt to our identity.
It's as if something inside us is saying, "If you look at this, you will have to change," and we are resisting it.
If we change, we will have to leave the comfort of the familiar, and it seems to be weighing on us.
I feel the need to reiterate, I am not giving advice to anyone, it is not my place, these are all the advice I give to myself, and as I research and examine myself, I come to some conclusions and I try to share them with you.
Since I have written my resignation, I guess I can continue with a small example from my own life...
There was a time when I felt that I was inefficient in my work. Tasks were piling up, I was procrastinating and then I felt guilty.
It wasn't that I couldn't manage my time; in fact, I knew very well which habits were holding me back. But I felt like confronting those habits would mean telling myself "you are not enough as you are".
So there were many times when I chose to turn off the screen and linger on social media. Because to look at it at that moment was to shake myself. I couldn't be bothered at that moment, I was going to suffer.
Then I realized that I was suffering because of these aversions.
This was the real obstacle to learning:
Sometimes it is not enough to know, you have to dare to look. Seeing brought with it the responsibility to act. The day I realized this was a milestone for me.
My procrastination decreased dramatically, my bad feelings eased, and the feeling of inefficiency lost much of its place in my life.
This is one such memory.
How Does Self-Doing Silent Sabotage Work?
This silent self-sabotage begins with little mental games that we often unknowingly delay our own change, avoiding confrontation.
Our mind gives us temporary peace of mind by bending and twisting the truth to maintain its comfort zone. There are 3 steps to this comfort.
Normalization
Sometimes the easiest way is to console ourselves by telling ourselves, "Everyone is like this." This statement diffuses responsibility and lightens our burden. If we are surrounded by people who behave in a similar way, it is easy to normalize our own situation.
"It will get better in time" follows the same logic; we postpone today's unpleasantness for the future, because that will preserve our peace of mind in the present. But normalization does not change reality; it only delays us from facing it.
Procrastination
Procrastination is often a trickier game than ignoring. Because we don't deceive ourselves; on the contrary, we silence our inner conscience by saying, "I will look at it, but not now."
This is a subtle strategy that protects the comfort zone of the mind. The problem is standing in front of the door, but we put off opening it until later. Thus we suspend for a while both the uneasiness of being aware and the difficulty of taking action.
Rationalization
Rationalization is the art of coming up with logical reasons for not changing. We twist reality with sentences like "Now is not the right time", "It's not really that bad", "This is what anyone would do in these circumstances", etc.
The mind chooses to twist the thought rather than letting go of the behavior because it takes less energy. In this way we both justify ourselves and avoid the emotional cost of change. But this escape is only a silent delay; the tension inside us builds up invisibly.
Solution Suggestions
Not a solution but a small suggestion
Unfortunately, it is very difficult to give a prescription for such tricky issues, i.e. a ready-made solution or a quick way out. Still, even if we don't have a clear solution, I think we can only create a small space of openness in our own minds.
We can think of this space as a stop where we can approach ourselves honestly:
Not to break the sabotage immediately, but to create a space where we can notice it for the first time, where we can shine a light on it...
Because often, just being able to look at what we don't want to see is a step in itself. In that moment, we can dare to say to ourselves:
"I don't have to solve this right now. I just accept that it exists."
In this moment of awareness, we just need to ask ourselves the right guiding question:
"What should I do?"
"What am I not ready to look at?"
To ask ourselves this question means to start observing our mind without judgment. Thus, for the first time, we can open the door to this silent sabotage, if it exists, and even if we can't solve it at the moment, we can begin to try to solve it.
Conclusion and Message to the Reader
Learning often begins not with acquiring new knowledge, but with being able to stand in front of that knowledge and look at it without averting our eyes.
Sometimes the greatest transformation sprouts when we dare to look at what our mind has silently pushed aside. Because seeing brings with it the responsibility to act.
Now it's your turn to ask yourself the question:
Well, is there something in your life that you know about right now, but you are avoiding looking at it? Perhaps putting off looking at that thing is the quietest form of self-sabotage that you do to yourself without realizing it.
If we can recognize this silent resistance, perhaps our next question will change:
"Now that I've seen it, how do I live with it?"
I will try to explore this in my next post.
Till then, stay loving and self-sabotaging.
Sources
- Socrates - Plato, Apologia, Phaedo
- Friedrich Nietzsche - Beyond Good and Evil, Thus Spoke Zarathustra
- Hannah Arendt - Eichmann in Jerusalem;
- Leon Festinger - A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance (1957)
- Daniel Kahneman - Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011)
- Sigmund Freud - The Ego and the Id;
