Dear J:

Habits, mental and behavioral, are about performing routine tasks (those we regularly repeat) without paying attention, and so to free us to pay attention to something else. To change a habit, it takes paying attention and paying attention takes effort.

We tie our shoes at this age inattentively- it is a behavioral habit. When young and learning to tie our shoes, we paid attention. Ever since, we do it effortlessly. Imagine that you currently tie your shoes so badly that you keep tripping and falling, the falls hurt and you bleed.

At this point, as you are reading this, you are not hurting and bleeding, correct? And you can imagine it will feel very differently if you were hurting and bleeding right now.

Because you know the difference; how much better it is not to be hurting and bleeding, you are motivated to change your habit of tying your shoes.

But regarding your mental habit of “this feeling of inadequacy and need to escape”. You wrote: “I can’t imagine NOT thinking this way”- you don’t know how it would feel like, believing you are adequate, so you don’t know the difference, therefore, you are not motivated to change this habit.

anita