Harnessing Prejudice, Part 2: Hitching Up The Wagon

Before you read this post, you might want to take a deep breath. This is one of those turning-an-idea-upside-down posts, and it’s entirely counter intuitive. So consider yourselves warned! 

 Background________

 Two of my long-term goals are to pull both my weight and my finances under control.  I like it being pretty, being thin, being healthy.  I like feeling financially secure, having enough money to  be generous to others at a whim, and to spend in ways that make me happy. 

Right now I am none of these things.

I like these things, I value them, but somehow, they don’t seem to *motivate* me. Not when it comes to making and maintaining changes in my lifestyle. 

So instead of pushing and should-ing myself to force motivation that will eventually fail, I’ve decided to strap the goals of health, exercise and finances to something that *does* motivate me…. the intellectual vanity I discovered a week or so ago.

That vanity is still successfully motivating me. I’m keeping up with my goals, sometimes exceeding them. So my intellectual vanity *does*  motivate me to make changes.

At first, I thought I’d need to use some mental trickery to create the illusion of a connection between intellect, weight and finances. But as I mused on my vanity, it’s implications, origins, and impact… I realized the connection was already there, in the shape of my prejudices.

The Prejudices________

You remember my prejudices, don’t you? I’ve certainly talked about them enough. Those ugly revelations from a week or so ago?week? No? Well, ok.  I’ll delve into my darkness again, just for you.

I found a subconscious belief that being overweight, and being poor, are connected to lower levels of intelligence.  (I still hate admitting that)

I’ve already written about some research studies on both topics. Later on, I’ll write about how to dismantle prejudices; not only are they unfair, but they interfere with accurate assessments.  But before taking them apart, I decided to hitch my prejudices up to that inner donkey of mine, and let him pull along my goals of weight and finances, while he’s going after that carrot of intellectual vanity he likes so much.

Actually “hitching the wagon up” means accepting that I do see physical appearance, and financial independence, as “markers” of intelligence (regardless of the accuracy of those views).  Next, I need to accept that I do not currently have those “markers”.  Ouch. Ok.  I can accept that.  But I want those markers!  I want to *seem* intelligent.

Once I’ve made those connections,  losing weight is no longer just about health and physical attractiveness… it’s about looking *smart*.  The same goes for finances — balancing the checkbook and paying down credit cards is no longer about actual money.. its about cultivating the appearance of being “smart”.

Positive Side-Effects____________

An interesting and valuable side effect of all this work is that while I’m hitching the goals of physical and fiscal improvement to my intellectual vanity wagon….  I’m de-coupling the idea of *actual* intelligence from the *appearance* of intelligence.

And both of my goals may actually increase my cognitive skills. 

Multiple studies suggest that exercise improves mental function, and some even suggest exercise can help the brain build new nerve cells. (Google turned up way too many examples for me to attempt to list, but here’s a good article from Newsweek.)  Good general health definitely helps the brain, and while I haven’t found studies on returning to a healthy weight and cognitive improvement, there was that study on being overweight, and cognitive decline.

So being in shape doesn’t just make me *look* smarter, it may actually MAKE me smarter.

What about finances? Well, having more money wont make me smarter.  But on-going stress is known to cause problems for the brain.   By reeling in my finances, reaching a level of security, I greatly reduce stress — which will help my brain function better.

Nifty how all of it fits together, isn’t it?_____

By the time I’d worked through this process of “hitching up the  wagon” the prejudices themselves are no longer necessary to link my financial and weight goals to my intellect.  The stereotypes can be safely taken apart, while leaving the motivations intact.

I’m not sure how to adapt this process for others; this was certainly a personal journey. 

But the idea of discovering your own personal vanity as a motivational factor is valuable, and linking other goals to that core motivation is certainly a lot more effective than trying to force yourself to adapt a “should” type motivation. 

What do you think? Feeling any personal inspiration, or just marveling at at the strangeness of that Mind-Mweaks chick? (It’s ok, if it’s the later; I kind of like being marveled at)

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MindTWEAK: “We know nothing about motivation. All we can do is write books about it.” -Peter F. Drucker, __________________________