That's too easy

In the previous post I wrote about our reluctance to believe corporations and the claims they made in advertisements.  I believe this lack of trust extends far beyond the world of advertising.  In our day to day lives whenever we are confronted with a problem, we often assume that the simplest solution is the correct solution, this leads us to solve many of our problems ourselves without the help of others, but when we are met with problems that we can't find a simple solution to, we seek help from others.  If you have come across a problem that you can't find a simple solution to however, an expectation arises that because it seems like a complex problem, there must be a complex solution, even though with every other problem in our lives we accept simplicity, we still insist that it has to be complicated because we couldn't figure it out on our own.

If you come across a problem that you couldn't figure out on your own, then whenever you seek help and ask others for solutions, the immediate predictable response is to reject any solution that is simple.  If we couldn't solve it ourselves, a simple solution won't work, we convince ourselves this has to be true, even to the point where we deny all evidence to the contrary.

You might be thinking that you are the exception and that you would accept a simple solution so let's take a basic example.  Most people in their lives will struggle with weight at some point.  They'll carry more than they want and they will seek a way to lose it.  There is one simple way to lose weight and it is the only way to lose weight: you must expend more calories than you consume.  That's it, that's the only truth about weight loss, if you want to get thinner, then you need to burn more calories than you are consuming.  Now ask yourself whether or not you accept that simple truth or whether like everyone else when it comes to weight loss you seek out more complex solutions.  Do you seek out weight loss programmes, exercise routines, nutritional advice?  Do you try and find "super foods" that will make you shed pounds of weight because you eat it?  If you said yes to any of these things was there always a caveat or a disclaimer or something buried deep within the information you were provided that simply said that you had to have a balanced diet and exercise along with the programme?

We refuse to accept simple solutions to problems we haven't been able to solve ourselves.  We utter the words "That's too easy" or "It's not that simple" in retort, I've done it myself, I openly admit that.  The question is why are we so reluctant to accept a simple answer?  Is it just a case of not wanting to feel stupid or incompetent for not figuring that out for ourselves?  When someone gives you a riddle and you spend ages trying to find the answer and eventually give in and they give you a simple one word answer, do you react the same way?  Is it different because we knew before we even tried that the answer would be simple?  Is the real reason we won't accept simplicity as a solution to problems we couldn't solve simply that we have convinced ourselves that a simple answer can't possibly exist?  If that's all it is, then how can you convince yourself that a simple answer does exist even if you can't find it, before you seek advice from other people so you are more open to simple solutions?

There's a concept that you will be aware of if you have ever been through a self-help section of a book store or Amazon, or if you've ever watched Oprah, that is the concept of applying the Law of Attraction to your life in general.  This law as popularized by books such as The Secret by Rhonda Byrne take the idea that if you have positive thoughts then positive things will happen to you and if you have negative thoughts then negative things will happen to you, that ultimately you attract into your life that which you focus your energy on.  Whilst there is little or no evidence to say that there is any actual force involved by doing this, there are reasons in psychology why this would actually work if you tried it with determination.  This in essence is a demonstration of merging the conscious and subconscious minds in pursuit of a goal, and depending on how fixated on that goal you become you can merge the unconscious mind as well into a single collective drive to achieve your goal.  This won't in and of itself guarantee success but it will create a stronger motivation and much deeper desire to pursue that goal and if you have a particularly strong cognitive bias then you will hold on to the thoughts and experiences that reinforce your belief and accelerate your progress and quickly discard those that don't.

Is it really that simple?  Well, no, nothing in life is ever without complications but again like losing weight this is a simple idea that has a basis in truth.  Whilst your success is not guaranteed because it depends on your actions more than anything else, it does show that the concept and the approach are easy enough to understand, the real question is whether you have the determination to follow through with it, or whether you will spend more time convincing yourself that there has to be more to it than that and making excuses not to try, or even worse, trying with the expectation of failing only to have those expectations validated and your own negative mentality reinforced for the exact same reason, that your consciousness is focusing on one expected outcome and you are actively working towards it, whether you want to admit it to yourself or not.

We can be our own worst enemies, nobody knows what to say to us to convince us we will fail better than ourselves, if only we could find a way to encourage ourselves so easily then we would be our own greatest allies.