Repeating Behaviors without Question

About the biology of desire

4/6/20231 min read

In a book called the Biology of Desire, Marc Lewis talks about the deep neural pathways that form when we repeat experiences that the brain likes, which brings us pleasure or helps us avoid pain, and the deeper these new neural pathways become, the more likely we are to repeat the behaviors without question.

This is why the bad habit just becomes second nature. You reach for the cigarette without “even thinking about it.” And we may have told ourselves that this habit helps us calm down, (and it may have helped in the past), when it has now just transformed into an addiction, something you do unconsciously, just because…you have done it for so long. In hypnosis for smoking cessation we visit the subconsicous and reprogram that silly desire for a cigarette to a new craving for a healthy/conscious way of living.

I am thrilled books like this are becoming popular and use science to explain why people from these addictions. No shame, its not too late to change the way you live your life, and adjust the rules to your own game!