Freedom Begins in the Mind

Recently, I've been spending time watching the new baby black crested mangabey at the zoo where I volunteer. His name is Sullivan. He's about two months old now—still tiny, still dependent on his mother's milk, still very much a baby. 

But something fascinating is happening. He's begun picking up pieces of lettuce and bringing them to his mouth. He's not actually eating the lettuce yet. He's copying his mother.

Watching him has been a delightful reminder that humans are apes too, and we learn much the same way. Before we understand the world, before we can reason about it, we imitate. We watch others. We mimic their behaviors. We absorb the habits, beliefs, fears, and preferences of the people around us.

This ability to learn through observation is one of our species' greatest strengths. It allowed human knowledge and culture to accumulate across generations. We don't each have to rediscover fire, invent language, or figure out social rules from scratch.

But this remarkable ability comes with a cost. The same brain that allows us to learn from others also makes us susceptible to being influenced by them. And that is why freedom begins in the mind.

When we think about freedom, we often think about external things—freedom of speech, freedom of movement, freedom from oppression. These freedoms matter enormously. But there is another kind of freedom that is just as important and often overlooked:

The freedom to think for yourself.

Your Brain Is Designed to Be Influenced

Every day, our thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors are being shaped by forces around us. Advertisers compete for our attention. Social media algorithms reward outrage and conformity. Peer groups exert pressure to fit in. Political movements, cultural narratives, and even workplace dynamics all attempt to influence what we believe and how we behave.

Most of this influence is not malicious. It is simply part of being human.

We evolved to be social because, for our ancestors, belonging to the group often meant survival. Individuals who paid attention to what others were doing and copied successful behaviors had an advantage.

The baby mangabey doesn't need anyone to explain to him that lettuce is food. He watches his mother and begins practicing the behavior long before he fully understands it.

Humans do the same thing.

Children imitate language, emotional reactions, social norms, and cultural beliefs long before they are capable of critically examining them. As adults, we continue to imitate, often without realizing it. We adopt opinions from our social groups, absorb assumptions from our cultures, and unconsciously respond to rewards and punishments in our environments.

Over time, these influences can become so deeply ingrained that we mistake conditioned responses for freely chosen decisions.

Freedom Requires Self-Awareness

The question is not whether we are influenced. We all are.

The question is whether we understand those influences well enough to choose how we respond to them.

Psychological freedom begins with self-awareness.

The moment we start asking questions, we reclaim power:

• Why do I believe this?
• Who taught me to think this way?
• Is this belief based on evidence or social pressure?
• Am I acting from my values or reacting from fear?
• Does this choice reflect who I want to be?

These questions interrupt automatic responses and create space for conscious choice.

Freedom lives in that space.

This is why critical thinking is so important. It is not merely an intellectual skill. It is a form of self-defense.

A person who understands behavioral psychology, cognitive biases, and social influence becomes significantly harder to manipulate. They become less dependent on social approval and more capable of acting according to their own values.

The Five Managerial Superpowers and Mental Freedom

Many people think leadership is about influencing others. But ethical leadership begins with learning to lead ourselves.

In Mastering the Five Managerial Superpowers, I explore five essential capacities that help individuals reclaim control over their thinking and behavior:

• Self-awareness
• Compassion
• Self-control
• Understanding behavioral science
• Managing conflict constructively

These are not merely management skills.

They are freedom skills.

Self-awareness helps us recognize when emotions and social pressures are driving our decisions.

Compassion allows us to understand others without becoming captive to their approval or disapproval.

Behavioral science teaches us how habits, rewards, and environments shape behavior—both our own and that of others.

Conflict management helps us resist manipulation through fear, intimidation, and social pressure.

Together, these skills create something powerful:

Psychological independence.

The ability to think clearly, act ethically, and choose deliberately instead of simply reacting.

Reclaiming Your Mind

Watching that little mangabey has reminded me of something profound.

Copying others is not a flaw in human nature. It is one of our greatest evolutionary strengths.

But maturity requires something more than imitation. At some point, we must move beyond merely copying the behaviors and beliefs around us and begin consciously deciding which ideas deserve our loyalty.

Freedom does not mean becoming immune to influence. That would be impossible.

Freedom means becoming aware of the forces shaping us and intentionally choosing which influences align with our values.

It means learning to pause before reacting.

It means questioning narratives, examining assumptions, and choosing principles over pressure.

Because while we cannot control everything happening around us, we can learn to better control how we respond.

That is where freedom begins.

Not in governments.
Not in institutions.
Not in other people.

But in the mind.

And perhaps one of the greatest forms of freedom available to human beings is this: the ability to understand how we are shaped, and then consciously choose who we wish to become.

If you would like practical tools for developing that kind of psychological independence, Mastering the Five Managerial Superpowers explores the behavioral science, self-awareness, and leadership skills that can help you become a more intentional, ethical, and resilient human being.

Because before we can lead others well, we must first learn how to lead ourselves.

Stop Sabotage with Science: The Behavioral Approach to Real Inclusion

Inclusion doesn’t fail because people disagree with it. It fails because it gets quietly sabotaged.

You’ve probably seen it — the subtle resistance. The eye-rolls. The “concerns” cloaked in civility. The way momentum dies, not with confrontation, but with passive-aggression. The result? Good people give up, culture stays the same, and real inclusion never takes hold.

This isn’t just a messaging problem. It’s a behavioral problem.

And that means it has a behavioral solution.

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The Real Barrier: Sabotage Is Behavior

When it comes to diversity and inclusion, we focus a lot on values — and that’s important. But values don’t change behavior unless we understand how behavior works.

The truth is: many people who sabotage inclusion efforts do it subtly. They exploit group dynamics, use manipulation tactics, and rely on the fact that most people don’t know how to push back effectively without escalating conflict.

That’s where behavioral science comes in.

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Why Behavioral Science Works

I teach behavior-shaping methods grounded in reinforcement psychology — the same science used to train dolphins, raise resilient kids, and build new habits in adults.

The core principle is simple:
👉 What gets reinforced, continues. What gets ignored and not reinforced, extinguishes over time.

This isn’t theoretical. It’s practical. You can train your workplace culture to resist sabotage. You can teach your team how to respond strategically, not emotionally. And you can stop bullying and manipulation before it takes root.

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Learn the Tools. Change the Culture.

At Humanist Learning Systems, my online courses combine ethics, compassion, and science to teach you and your team:

✅ How to stop bullying and harassment using behavioral tools
✅ How to identify and neutralize passive-aggressive sabotage
✅ How to reinforce inclusive norms — and make them stick
✅ How to build cultures rooted in dignity and humanism

Inclusion can’t thrive if you’re fighting behavior with good intentions alone.
You need strategy. You need tools. You need science.

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Ready to Make Inclusion Real?

Explore my online courses at Humanist Learning Systems.
Let’s stop the sabotage — and build the future of work with purpose, clarity, and compassion.

Reclaiming Inclusion: Advancing Equity Without Saying ‘Diversity

 Introduction:

In today’s climate, even the word “diversity” has become politically charged. In some sectors, using it openly may result in backlash—or even legal consequences. But inclusion isn’t optional. Organizations still need to harness the full spectrum of human potential to thrive, adapt, and solve complex problems. Inclusion is about ensuring people can contribute without being excluded, sabotaged, or harassed. And that remains vital, regardless of what we call it.

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1. Inclusion Is the Goal—Not the Word

The pushback against DEI often centers on terminology. But let’s be clear: we don’t need a word to keep doing the work. Inclusion means making sure everyone—regardless of background, identity, or lived experience—can contribute meaningfully. If the word “diversity” becomes a political lightning rod, we can use other framing—like representation, belonging, psychological safety, or inclusive leadership—without losing the essence.

Tip: Reframe your goals around “effective team participation,” “broadening access,” or “removing participation barriers.”

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2. The Real Threat to Inclusion? Sabotage and Harassment

The biggest threats to inclusion don’t come from regulations—they come from inside. Passive-aggressive saboteurs, workplace bullies, and gatekeepers can quietly undo inclusive efforts. They withhold information, sideline new hires, or harass people into quitting—all without ever breaking an official policy.

Inclusion fails not when we stop using the word, but when we let toxic behaviors fester.

Organizations need strategies rooted in behavioral psychology to recognize and stop these patterns. It’s not about training people to “be nice”—it’s about changing the reinforcement systems that allow bullying and exclusion to persist so that bullies can't exclude people from the work group anymore. 

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3. Why Inclusion Still Pays Off

Inclusive teams don’t just feel better—they perform better. Research shows that when people from different backgrounds are truly allowed to collaborate, they identify risks faster, innovate more, and solve problems more effectively. But that only happens when team members feel safe speaking up—and that means rooting out behaviors that silence or sideline differing viewpoints.

If you’re hiring for talent, you need to protect that talent from saboteurs.

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4. How to Protect Your Inclusion Initiatives in a Politicized World

You can protect inclusion efforts without waving a DEI banner:

• Embed it into leadership values: Talk about fairness, safety, and performance, not identity politics.

• Use data, not slogans: Focus on participation metrics, attrition rates, and engagement scores.

• Train your managers in behavioral techniques: Give them tools to shut down sabotage and ensure new ideas aren’t ignored or punished.

• Make inclusion a performance issue: If someone is undermining a team member’s ability to contribute, it’s a leadership failure—not a personality clash.

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5. Next Steps: Train for Real Inclusion

Stopping harassment and sabotage requires more than good intentions—it takes skills. My courses are designed to teach exactly that, using proven behavioral psychology techniques to:

• Stop variably reinforced harassment

• Create reinforcement systems that protect inclusion

• Identify and neutralize saboteurs of inclusive culture

Whether you call it “diversity,” “belonging,” or “collaborative team culture,” the goal is the same: make sure everyone is included and no one on your team is being sabotaged.

Learn how to stop harassment using behavioral psychology →https://humanistlearning.com/programsoffered/#bullying
Learn how to safeguard your inclusion initiatives →https://humanistlearning.com/safeguarding-diversity-and-inclusion-unmasking-saboteurs/

Understanding and Retraining Conditioned Reflexes: The Toilet Trigger

 Have you ever walked past a restroom, thought you might need to go, and then the second you opened the door, it was like your bladder hit the panic button? You went from "maybe I could pee" to "I need to pee NOW!" in a matter of seconds. If you're nodding your head, you're not alone. This isn’t just a quirk of aging—this is your brain doing exactly what you accidentally trained it to do.

The Toilet Trigger: A Case of Classical Conditioning

What’s happening here is a form of classical conditioning. Just like Pavlov's dogs began to salivate at the sound of a bell, our brains associate certain environments or stimuli with specific responses. In this case, the sight of the bathroom (or even the door) becomes a trigger for your body to prepare for urination. Your brain has learned: bathroom = time to pee. The reaction is automatic. It bypasses conscious thought.

The good news? If your brain was trained into this pattern, it can also be retrained out of it.

How to Retrain Your Brain

Retraining your brain takes intentional practice. If you want to stop the near-accident urgency that hits when you see a toilet, you can.

Here’s how:

1. Awareness – Recognize that this is a reflex, not a true emergency. You have more control than it feels like.

2. Delay the response – When you feel that strong urge upon seeing the toilet, pause. Take a breath. Wait a few seconds. You’re teaching your body that the trigger doesn’t need to equal immediate action.

3. Gradual desensitization – Practice walking into the bathroom without immediately going. Do something else for a moment. Over time, this helps break the tight link between stimulus and response.

4. Consistency – Like any habit, retraining takes time—typically around 30 days of consistent effort. So practice. 

Why This Skill Matters

This isn't just about bladder control. This is about brain control. Once you understand how your brain is constantly reacting to triggers around you—often without your permission—you can begin to take your power back.

Your emotional responses to stress? Conditioned. Your defensiveness in conflict? Conditioned. Your impulse reactions when things go wrong? Conditioned.

Just like the bathroom example, all of these responses can be retrained.

This Is What My Book Is All About

In Mastering the Five Managerial Superpowers, I walk you through exactly how to retrain your brain to respond more strategically to the world around you. The foundational skills of self-awareness, compassion, and self-control allow you to stop reacting automatically and start choosing your responses with intention.

Whether you’re leading a team or just trying to lead a more centered life, understanding how to rewire your reflexes is a superpower worth mastering.

So the next time your bladder tries to boss you around, remember: it’s not magic. It’s just conditioning. And you can hack it.

Ready to learn how? Check out Mastering the Five Managerial Superpowers and start hacking your brain today. https://humanistlearning.com/mastering-the-five-managerial-superpowers/

Why Are We So Obsessed with Cats? It’s All About Variable Reinforcement

Ever wonder why people can become so obsessed with cats? The answer lies in a psychological concept called variable reinforcement. This happens when sometimes we get what we want—like a cat’s affection—and sometimes we don’t. 

Cats are perfect at this because, let’s face it, they have their own agenda. Sometimes they give us attention, and sometimes they completely ignore us. This unpredictability makes us crave their affection even more.

The key is that variable reinforcement strengthens behaviors and attachments. It’s the same mechanism behind a lot of other behaviors, from gambling addictions to attachment in abusive relationships. In fact, variable reinforcement is one of the reasons people stay in toxic situations—they’re constantly chasing the next positive moment, no matter how rare it is.

If you want to understand more about how this works and how it can affect relationships, check out my website bullyvaccineproject.com. It’s free and includes helpful primers on variable reinforcement and how to break the cycle if you find yourself in an unhealthy relationship dynamic.

As for cats, they’re not being manipulative—they just have cat thoughts and don’t think like humans. But their behavior can teach us a lot about why we attach to unpredictable sources of affection.

Unveiling the Secrets of "Mastering the 5 Managerial Superpowers"

I am thrilled to announce the release of my latest book, Mastering the 5 Managerial Superpowers. This is not just another book on management and leadership—it's a deep dive into the science of how you can truly gain control over your responses, hack your brain using behavioral science, and manage conflict with unprecedented effectiveness.

I honestly believe it’s the most important work I’ve ever written. Here’s why.

Foundational Skills: Building the Bedrock of Effective Leadership

At the heart of Mastering the 5 Managerial Superpowers is the concept of foundational skills. This starts with cultivating self-awareness and compassion—because understanding yourself and showing empathy towards others are the cornerstones of effective leadership.

Once you’ve laid this groundwork, you can move on to mastering self-control. This isn’t about repressing your emotions but rather about understanding them so deeply that you can choose how to respond. Instead of reacting with a knee-jerk impulse, you can respond strategically, turning every situation into an opportunity for positive outcomes.

Hacking Your Brain: The Science of Change

The second big idea in the book is about hacking your brain. I explore how you can use insights from behavioral science to literally rewire your default reactions and change how you deal with problems. Change isn’t just possible; it’s something you can engineer within yourself.

Imagine being able to shift your mindset, break free from unproductive habits, and approach challenges with a renewed sense of clarity. This book shows you how to harness the power of behavioral science to make these changes not just aspirational but achievable.

Managing Conflict: Mastering the Art of Response

Finally, Mastering the 5 Managerial Superpowers delves into one of the most critical aspects of leadership and - life: managing conflict. The key to effective conflict management isn’t just about resolving disagreements. It's about managing your own response to conflict.

By mastering the skills of self-control and strategic response, you can approach conflicts not as threats but as opportunities. This book equips you with the tools to navigate these situations with confidence and poise, ensuring that you lead by example even in the most challenging circumstances.

Why This Book Matters

In a world where change is constant and challenges are inevitable, the ability to control your responses and lead with intention is more important than ever both in your personal and professional life. Mastering the 5 Managerial Superpowers is designed to help you develop these critical skills so that you can not only survive but thrive.

The reason I think this is the best book I've ever written is because it's not just about leadership. It's about self management. And how to accomplish that using behavioral science to change how you respond. I feel like I've shared the secrets of the universe and how to be human - better - in this book. Like everything else I've written was leading up to this. It's an odd feeling to have.  

The funny thing is - I wrote this course and book, because someone asked me to. They told me the topics they wanted me to cover. I thought they were great and I wrote about my approach to self awareness, managing change, conflict management and - managing actual real people. 

The point is, whether you’re a seasoned manager, a new manager, or just want to learn how to be a better human, this book offers actionable insights  based on science that will transform the way you approach your work and your life. 

I truly believe that the tools and techniques outlined in this book can make a profound difference in your life and in your journey as a leader. Thank you for your support, and I look forward to hearing how Mastering the 5 Managerial Superpowers impacts you.

Learn More: 

The online course can be accessed at: https://humanistlearning.com/mastering-the-five-managerial-superpowers/

The paperback is at amazon: https://amzn.to/3SXJy4O

The ebooks are at amazon: https://amzn.to/3AsFvHc

and at your favorite ebook retailers through draft2digital: https://books2read.com/b/bxANgv

The audio book is in process and will be posted at the humanistlearning website once it's available.

The danger of psychological warfare - intelligence isnt' a defense

Americans are being subjected to psychological warfare and most have no clue what exactly is happening and why it matters.

I have heard very smart people equate the problem with intelligence, only stupid people fall for fake news. As an expert in behavioral conditioning - let's just put that idea to bed. INTELLIGENCE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH BEHAVIORAL CONDITIONING!

This isn't about who is smart and who isn't. And it's not even a partisan issue - despite most people wanting it to be.

Behavioral conditioning - can make you hum dixie when you hear a specific bird whistle. And you won't even know why that song is suddenly in your head. It just will be. You won't even know when or how you were conditioned to think of that song when you get that specific stimulus. In fact, you won't even know that you were conditioned, you may not think anything is odd at all. THAT is the power of behavioral conditioning!

Most people have zero knowledge that they are being conditioned/manipulated and even ones who are - still have their behavior changed - because - behavioral conditioning does not require the consent of the target!

Behavioral conditioning can make you think certain thoughts. It can make you NOT think certain thoughts and trigger certain other thoughts whenever certain stimulus is brought up. It's at the heart of cult behavior and resistance to outside information. It's why republicans "what about" - every time they are told a republican has behaved badly.

EVERYONE is being conditioned by their conditions at all times. Most of this is benign and a result of natural consequences. But it can also be done malignantly by bad actors. Think of adults who groom children for sex, or people who end up in abusive relationships they can't get out of because their partner is abusing them - not just physically - but psychologically. People who have this happen - don't consent to this happening. They don't even know it's happened. They think their thoughts are their own and that they are being totally rational even if they aren't.

And again, everyone is susceptible. EVERYONE! We are all susceptible because we are all human and all wired the same way.

Can this be resisted?
Yes - but only with great effort and with awareness of a) how it's being done and b) with counter measures to resist the conditioning. And even then - it's super hard to resist this sort of conditioning. And THAT is what Russians have been doing to us. It's called - psychological warfare for a REASON!

The techniques that can help you train a bully to stop - can also convince people to join a cult - or vote a certain way. The reason I teach what I do - even though I know it can be used for evil - is because - it's already being used for evil and our only chance of protecting ourselves - is to understand how it's happening and to take control of the dynamic.

Any of my online courses on how to stop bullying (and yes - some are free), will teach you how this works. https://humanistlearning.com/category/bullyingharassment/

People who have gotten my book - The Bully Vaccine have told me that it's helped them recognize these dynamics as they play out in their lives and help them change those dynamics and resist the conditioning they have experienced. https://humanistlearning.com/the-bully-vaccine-book/

It's critical we learn how to defend ourselves. Learn more - and be part of the solution. 

Positive Psychology and the words "No" and Stop

Spoke to teacher, she asked about positive psychology – not allowed to use the word no or stop – as they are negative.

First – words aren’t negative. They are just arbitrary sounds. How you respond can be positive, negative or neutral.

Second, if you positively reinforce a word – it becomes positive, not negative.

Third, Stop and No – should be used as deltas and positively reinforced when the child or person responds positively to it – that’s how you create a positive association with the word instead of a negative one.

Fourth – you may not be able to totally do this – as others probably do use these words as negatives and negatively reinforce them.

Regardless – you do need delta’s and bridges. You just aren’t supposed to respond to a positive response to a delta using a negative response. You want to positively respond to the correct behavior once a delta is issued. All a delta is – is – that wasn’t correct – stop and reset.

Basically focusing on the words and not whether you are positively or negatively  responding to them – IS the problem.

Finally – this isn’t “new” – behavioralists have been studying this forever. Every time I come across a positive parenting or positive psychology person – it’s like – they just discovered behavioral psychology – read up on it and don’t fully understand it – but they start teaching it anyway.

I was apprenticed in this and it’s frustrating to listen to teachers who have been through a positive psychology training – a person with a background in clinical psychology a) not have been exposed to behavioral psychology at all and b) not be taught behavioral psychology properly!  It underpins everything. Seriously. It does.

Has there been any research showing that when an alternate reward is provided it is effective in helping to break the drive for the original reward/desire ?

Someone taking my Why is Change so Hard? course, had a question.  That question - is kind of geeky - and involves understanding rewards, alternate rewards and so forth. That's why I'm posting it here. 

Yes - that's actually pretty standard protocol and it does make eliminating the old behavior easier.  Basically - you stop rewarding the old behavior and simultaneously reward the desired new behavior.  You still have the resistance, but it's less.

An example would be - if you had a rat that pressed a lever to get a treat.  If you simply make the lever not work - the rat will escalate and blow out.  If you give them an alternate way to get a treat, they will experience less stress and it will make the transition more smooth.

Another example - if you have a cat that is scratching furniture - unless you give them a scratching post - you aren't going to eliminate the scratching behavior - because it's something that they NEED to do. So - you reward them positively for scratching in the appropriate place.

With humans - it works the same.  Positively reward the alternate behavior, and remove the reward for the unwanted behavior.

Here is a link to google scholar on rewarding alternate behavior.  The 2nd citation is about rats. LOL https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0,10&qsp=2&q=reinforcement+of+alternative+behavior&qst=br

Here is an example of relevant research 

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1975-20693-001

Examined the course of extinction of 1 behavior as a function of the presence and subsequent absence of reinforcement for alternative behavior. 4 experiments were conducted, using a total of 102 male hooded rats in 3 experiments and 30 adult White Carneaux pigeons in the 4th. Major findings are: (a) Topography and reinforcement schedule for alternative behavior had little differential effect. (b) High-frequency reinforcement of alternative behavior increased suppressive effects of extinction, and low-frequency reinforcement did not. (c) Reinforced alternative behavior maintained for a relatively long period decreased subsequent recovery of the original response programed for extinction, resulting in a substantial saving in total number of extinction responses. (d) Temporary reinforcement of alternative behavior produced more permanent suppression in the context of simple extinction than in the context of SD (change in stimulus) periods in discrimination learning. (17 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)

Take the course - or get the book and learn more

https://humanistlearning.com/change1/

https://amzn.to/2VYVMLN 

Using Behavioral Psychology to Influence people in the workplace

I received this question from a reporter who was interested in gaining a deeper understanding on the relationship between behavioral science psychology and how HR uses that to influence employees.

They were looking for specific examples of how it is used.

I provided an example of how it is not used, but should be. It has to do with harassment situations.  There is more that we can do.

With harassment situations, behavioral psychology could be really useful. Behavioral Psychologists have known for 70 years how to make unwanted behavior stop.  If HR learned these techniques, they could use them to help stop bullying and harassment in the workplace.

What does this look like in practice?

1. How reports of harassment are responded to, can be tweaked to take advantage of what we know needs to happen to make unwanted behavior stop. Right now – current processes tend to make things worse. It’s unintentional, but it still happens.

2. Employees reporting problems can be provided training that would help them understand – how to make it stop – in a way that goes beyond – just keep reporting it.

3. We could revamp our current sexual harassment training programs to include this information. CA law for instance, requires training on how to stop abusive behavior in the workplace. We can fulfill that requirement by providing a behavioral psychology based training that teaches – how to make unwanted behavior stop.

What happens when you provide this sort of training?  You change the culture of the organization. I did a training for a law firm once. Trained all their offices. What they said happened, as a result of a behavioral training, was that people started behaving better with each other. The one problem person who had been identified prior to the training quit, and everyone else just treated each other with dignity and professionalism.  

When you give people the knowledge of how to handle difficult interpersonal interactions with grace and with dignity – using science – it changes everything. 

If you want to learn more or would like to train your staff and management on these techniques - check out my courses at: https://humanistlearning.com/category/bullyingharassment/

Can I condition myself to be happy in the morning (be a morning person)?

Yes. You can condition yourself to be a better morning person. Habit and behavior formation is well studied and just takes time to accomplish.

1) set a regular time to get up and don’t push snooze. Just - get up and get started. Will you be cranky at first? Of course. That’s part of the learning process. Accept it as part of the learning process and don’t let your cranky get in the way of actually getting up.
2) Congratulate yourself on getting up. How awesome is it. Yes - you are tired and cranky - but you still got out of bed when you wanted to.
3) Find a nice way to use the extra morning time you just gave yourself. Indulge in a little something to reward yourself. Only do this when you actually get up and get going.
4) Remind yourself how awesome you are for getting up even when you don’t want to.

After about 1 month - it should be a habit and you will feel better about getting up on time and be way less cranky about it.

If you want to learn more about the science of behavior and habit formation - and more importantly - habit unlearning - check out my online course here: https://humanistlearning.com/change1/

Humanist vs Behaviorist Dialectic

Over the summer, I had the pleasure of attending a meeting of the International Humanistic Management Association. I met some wonderful people - including Benito Teehankee from the Philippines. I will be interviewing him for the management association in October  - so be sure to sign up for my mailing list - to get notified of how to participate.  (Links below).

After the meeting - he sent me this message: "I'm fascinated with your conceptual background -- a humanist behaviorist. I used to think that this was a contradiction in terms because of Skinner's focus on extrinsic motivators but I'm very open to learning from you."

This question has to do with the practice of psychology and competing schools - humanist and behaviorist. I am not a trained psychologist. I am a philosophic humanist. But I do understand and integrate the science into my work. Anyway - here is my response.

Regarding the humanist/behaviorist thing. It’s not either or anymore – it’s both.   What did Blaise Pascal say? “A man does not show his greatness by being at one extremity, but rather by touching both at once.”  And the other quote – by I have no idea whom – The opposite of a great truth – is often another great truth.  That is the case here.

The concerns that the humanists had about behaviorism was that behaviorism both took away agency and dehumanized the human. The reality is – behaviorism is like evolution. It’s scientific fact. Humanists have adapted it and embraced it. They don’t call it “behaviorism” because of the historic conflict about it, but if you know behaviorism – you understand that what the humanists are doing – is using behaviorism.

I have yet to talk to a psychologist who doesn’t recognize this reality even if they don’t spend time pondering it.  When I spoke to the psychologist at my son’s school about it (she uses my book on bullying), I joked about the irony that a Humanist was teaching a behaviorist approach. She thought it was funny too, but agreed – it’s not either or – it’s both. You can’t really practice clinical psychology and help clients without using behavioral techniques. And if you try to – you are going to be guilty of malpractice. Both the humanist approach and the behaviorist approaches are true and have been integrated.  The academic debate – is basically dead. Yay Science!

As for the agency problem - neuroscience is once again putting agency into question which theoretically threatens the foundation of humanism. But I think what will probably be found is similar to the behaviorist non-problem problem.  It doesn’t negate agency as there is clearly a feedback loop as learning occurs somehow. It’s more that our understanding of agency – is that – our agency has limitations – and neuroscience is just going to end up explaining those limitations in a more biological way than behaviorism did. But the limitations on agency we are talking about – are the same limitations – just being looked at through a different scientific lens.  Regardless, the humanists will have to adapt to the science as they always do once it’s incontrovertible.

Also regarding this. I am philosophically humanist so my goal is to use scientifically validated techniques to solve problems – because my goal is to solve problems. I don’t have a horse in any given scientific debate. I just want to be less wrong and more right.

I am also ok with uncertainty, ambiguity and seeming contradictions as I understand what might seem like a contradiction – isn’t – if both things are true. So instead of fighting the truth of what science finds, I instead – try to figure out how to integrate the information into a new understanding of reality.

Some truths seem really counter-intuitive at first, but once we adjust to the reality and integrate it – we can’t understand how we even muddled through with our old understanding as the new understanding is so much more full.  Examples of this include coming to terms with plate tectonics and realizing the earth is spinning. Once you get over the – no way – it can’t actually work that way – and accept the reality of what we have learned through science, our understanding of reality is so much fuller. And that gets us back to philosophy.

Which brings me to Viktor Frankel and his logotherapy (get his book - The Unheard Cry for Meaning). Which is a philosophic therapy. Philosophic therapy on it's own - can be very beneficial. So is behavioral therapy. Both work. But when you combine logotherapy (philosophy) with behavioral therapy (science) - you get therapy that works REALLY well.  It's not either or - it's both. Together - for a more powerful solution that actually works.

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Learn more about the International Humanistic Management Association: http://humanisticmanagement.international/

And sign up for the mailing list to be notified of our live online events: http://humanisticmanagement.international/membership/sign-up/

To learn more about how to integrate philosophy and science into behavioral based solutions - check out my courses and books: https://humanistlearning.com/jennifer-hancock/

Problems with Change Management

There are reasons why people resist change and techniques to help them adjust. Science really can help us be more successful.

I have helped organizations – both non-profit and for profit – through change processes. I’ve helped nonprofit with toxic volunteer employee relations build a thriving volunteer program spanning several departments. I’ve helped redesign business processes for a 1/2 billion dollar company so that our acquisition team could close 8 deals a week instead of the 2 per month we had been doing. And, I’ve got a background in behavioral psychology to understand why people resist change and how to help them overcome it.

Here are 3 reasons why change processes fail and how to fix them.

1. Not understanding that change requires unlearning and unlearning follows a very predictable process.  If we are going to change something, it means that we are doing something now and we want to do it differently. That means giving up the old way and adopting the new way. For a behaviorist – this means – unlearning. All unlearning follows a pattern. Understand what that pattern is and how to trigger it  - and you can more easily control the process.

2. Not understanding that resistance to change doesn’t mean rejection of change.  Resistance to change is instinctual. We are asking people to unlearn habits and habits are hard to change, even for people who want to change. The resistance that occurs isn’t necessarily a rejection of the new processes. It’s really just an instinctual inability to let go of old habits. This manifests as all sorts of cranky behavior by the team, but it’s predicted to occur so there is no reason to get worked up about it.

3. Taking the resistance to change personally. The number of managers I’ve heard blame the employees for not understanding the brilliant ideas behind the change request  is stunning. People insert a LOT of ego into their efforts and take it personally when they experience resistance. Good managers understand how to help employees through that and the ones that succeed – get their egos out of the way and focus on helping their staff cope with the stress that is – change.

Hope this helps. I teach an online course on this. Why is Change so Hard https://humanistlearning.com/change1/ – which discusses the behavioral dynamic playing out and how behaviorists trigger and control the process.

What can restaurants do to better protect workers from harassment?

I teach how to stop harassment using behavioral psychology. We all know what the solutions are. Better reporting processes and responses. But what does that mean?

The way to stop harassment is to consistently deny the harasser their reward. This is problematic because most managers have never been taught how to do this. They assume things are personal problems instead of criminal problems. Because let’s be clear – harassment is a criminal matter!

 3 things need to happen.

1) Managers need to be trained on how to stop harassment situations so they can intervene more effectively.
2) HR needs to create reporting processes and investigation processes that are consistently applied because the random nature of how these things happen benefits the harasser.
3) There need to be real immediate consequences to anyone found guilty.

Harassers never have just one victim. These things aren’t personal, it’s a pattern of behavior. HR and managers tasked with dealing with this need to stop thinking of these things as occurring in isolation and if they find someone who has behaved badly – get rid of them.

To learn more – take one of my many courses on how to use behavioral science to stop harassment in the workplace.

https://humanistlearning.com/category/bullyingharassment/

It’s been too long that these behaviors have been tolerated in the workplace

Bullying in the Workplace has been tolerated for far too long. It’s time we do something about it.

Bullying which can manifest as harassment or discrimination is tough to stop. This is because it’s hard to get any behavior to stop. We are all creatures of habit. Habits are hard to break. Harassment/discrimination and bullying are habits. People who do them don’t even necessarily understand that they are doing something wrong. It’s just how they learned to behave.  And yes, that’s very sad.

The problem is that any attempt to get a bully to stop will almost always result in retaliation. Retaliation is predicted in the behavioral model.  The good news is that even though this behavior is predicted that doesn’t mean we have to tolerate it.

Bullying is a learned behavior and it can be unlearned. Decades of research by behavioral scientists have taught us what works and what doesn’t to get unwanted behaviors to stop. It’s time we start applying that knowledge to the problem of bullying in the workplace.

The fact that we don’t have to tolerate harassment/bullying makes it all the more important that we start actively teaching these skills to our employees. You can’t teach what you don’t know.  The first step is to learn what the specific skills are that work and why they work so that you can then teach them to your supervisors and your staff.  In that order.

Imagine what the average workplace would be like if there were no bullies.  We have been tolerating bullies in our workplaces for far too long because we didn’t know there was an alternative. Now that we do, it’s time we put the knowledge we have to work to get it to stop.

My company Humanist Learning Systems offers a variety of bullying and harassment training programs to teach the behavioral psychology techniques required to get bullies to stop. Learn more at: https://humanistlearning.com/category/bullyingharassment/ 

The Power of Negative Attention

What to do when someone is acting badly to get your attention

If you have a child, you know that when you ignore them, like say – you are on an important telephone call, your child will try politely to get your attention and then turn to ever more drastic measures to get your attention. this is the power of negative attention.

The same thing happens with animals. Most of the time when someone comes to me with an animal behavior problem or a child behavior problem, they don’t realize that they have been positively reinforcing the negative behavior they don’t want. They don’t realize that they themselves are the problem, not their child or animal

If you want to encourage good behavior, you have to catch the animal, or your child, doing something good in the moment and reward them for the good thing they just did. the more you do this, the better their behavior comes.

If you ignore them except when they are bad, you perpetuate the bad behavior. Why? Because even negative attention is better than being ignored!

Check out this article from Counselling Resources on The Power of Negative Attention:
http://counsellingresource.com/features/2010/12/07/the-power-of-negative-attention/ 

You will notice the author, Gordon Shippey, talks about the same operant conditioning dynamics I teach in my bullying book and in my humanistic parenting and management programs. He talks about extinction bursts and “ignoring” problem behavior.

But he also brings up a really important point, which is that completing the extinction protocol is REALLY hard to do. It’s much easier to train up the good behavior you want and reward the positive behavior you do want than to extinguish the bad behavior you don’t want. Both require you to control your own behavior and responses so that you can catch people being good so that you can reward them.

Don’t underestimate how much behavior, good and bad, is done just to get attention. If you want to encourage positive attention seeking behavior, you have to become more responsive to your child’s attempts to get your attention and reward them with your attention instead of forcing them to become little monsters before you give them your time.

Be present. You and your child will be happier.