There Is No End: How Your Brain Gets Caught in Loops and Cycles that Don't End

Welcome back to the internal journey, I'm your host Kam Knight, author of several best selling books in the area of mental & human performance.

Today I want to talk about a concept that took me a long time to realize, and when I did it, it had a profound shift on my success and growth, and I know it will for you!

It’s not an easy concept to explain or describe, but I going to try anyways.

It’s a concept I call “there is no end.”

That is, our mind can get caught in a loop saying or doing something, and that behavior never end

For example, most of us wait for the right moment to stop doing something.

When eating, we wait for our appetite to end to stop, so we keep eating until it is too much or we feel too full.

When watching television or Netflix, we wait for the desire to stop watching to turn it off, so we continue binging.

It’s the same with video games, we keep playing thinking after the next life, round, or level, we will stop, but we don’t.

This also applies to social media. Although our intention is to stop scrolling after the next post, image, or video we keep scrolling, sometimes mindlessly.

It specially happens with alcohol and drugs. We tell ourselves one more drink or one more hit, but after the additional drink or hit, we keep going.

I call this the runaway process

We start doing something and we keep doing it.

We think we’ll stop after the next bite, show, game, post, or hit.

We think our desire will end with the next one, and sometimes we are convinced it will end with the next one.

However, it doesn’t end and we keep going.

This also happens when we put off or postpone a task or activity

When we don’t want to do something, we tell ourselves we will do it later, next week, next weekend, next month, or next time.

When we tell ourselves this, we are convinced we will do it next time.

Absolutely convinced.

But when the next arrives, we push it off to the next and next and the next after that.

Just as we keeping eating, watching, or playing, the pattern of pushing things off doesn’t end either.

This specially happens with busyness

One of most deceptive parts of our mind is that when it doesn’t want us to do something, it will avoid it by making us busy.

Our schedule will fill up with so many other priorities, that we don’t have time for the commitment.

What’s interesting is that the busyness doesn’t end.

The mind will keep throwing new priorities and problems at us.

Before we finish one thing, it is already thinking of others to add to our plate.

Once we get over one hurdle, a few more are waiting inline.

If we wait for the busyness to end, we end up waiting for the rest of our lives.

People spend or waste their entire lives telling themselves they will start or stop something after this is done or after that is over.

The point is, there is no end

Our desire for one more, pattern off pushing things off to the next, or waiting for the busyness to end doesn’t end.

If we wait for the desire, pattern, or busyness to end, we will wait for the rest of our lives.

And many have.

Their whole life goes by because they keep saying after one more, next time, or when this is done.

When your brain gets caught in this loop, it doesn’t end

The process keeps continues.

Therefore, you have to be conscious when you get caught in a runaway process like this.

You have to make the conscious decision to stop.

You can’t wait for the brain to stop, because as I said, it is caught in a loop and can’t stop.

It needs your help to pull it out of the loop

You have to make a conscious choice to stop and end the cycle, which sometimes requires sheer will and force to do it.

So, anytime you hear yourself say:

one more bite, show, game, post, or hit

after the next day, week, month, or time

after when this or that are done

Know that it might not be one more, next time, or after this or that are done, and your brain will continue the cycle.

Know that you need to consciously end the cycle

With that said, if you want to stop eating, you can’t wait for the appetite to end, but make a hard decision stop.

If you want to stop watching TV or playing video games, you can’t assume you will stop after the next show or game, but pick up the remote and turn off the TV yourself.

If you are always putting things off, you need to take hard action to stop doing that.

If you are always busy, you have to figure out a way to stop the busyness.

It’s not going to end on its own.

Hope I explained this well and that it made sense

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It helps more than you know.

Again this is Kam Knight of the internal Journey, until next time.