How to Recognize and Combat Thinking Traps That May Be Controlling Your Life

As a human being, you probably will have noticed that what people think and say often bears little relation to how they act. Is it because individuals think what they say is accurate when it isn’t?

According to the concept of The Thinking Trap, this is the case. We have a misguided view of what we do and why we do it. What we say is not a guide to our real selves and what we do is a much clearer insight into who we really are. Disassociation of what we say and do operates in almost all aspects of existence from what we perceive to how we behave.

The Introspective Illusion

The introspective illusion is the ideology that we like to know about ourselves and how we do things, but it is actually misplaced confidence. We think of ourselves as sensible and rational but we actually make up stories about ourselves and others about what we think is going on. These stories act as implicit theories that explain our own decisions. These explanations are not to do with our ability to accurately introspect, but we tell ourselves and others these stories, not knowing that they are actually not real.