What Keeps You Locked in Place

Fortunately, I responded to my mother’s programming with an unshakable faith in my intelligence. Unfortunately, I also developed an unpardonable self-assurance that I didn’t need to try very hard at school. I learned that I could coast and still pull down decent grades. 

This lucky streak continued through college at Rose Hulman Institute of Technology and the MBA program at Indiana University—and emboldened me (despite my years of suboptimal effort for academic studies) to seek a PhD at UCLA. But I could not articulate why I needed a doctorate in organizational behavior or what I would do with it. Coasting had gotten me this far, I reasoned. Why not see where continued coasting could take me? 

At UCLA, I was blessed with classmates who were my intellectual superiors and professors who were not only light-years smarter but also intimidating presences who were not shy about humiliating me for my vanities and hypocrisies. It was a necessary comeuppance. I was twenty-six years old and finally learning that I was at UCLA to earn a PhD, not merely receive it. I needed that many years to overcome the unintended consequences of my mother’s programming. 

All of us are programmed in some way by our parents. Mom and Dad can’t help it (and it’s usually well-meaning). They shape our beliefs, our social values, how we treat other people, how we behave in relationships, even which sports teams we cheer for. More than anything else, they program our self-image. 

From our early days in the crib—before we can crawl, walk, or speak—they’re forensically studying our behavior for clues about our talents and potential. This is most obvious when siblings are involved. Over time, with enough “evidence,” our parents subdivide us into distinct personalities: the smart one, the pretty one, the strong one, the nice one, the responsible one—whichever of the many descriptors seems to apply at the time. 

It’s as if they’re unwittingly trying to turn us into an archetype of a human being, erasing all the nuance. If we’re not careful, we not only accept the programming, but also adapt our behavior to it. The smart one falls back on cleverness rather than expertise, the pretty one relies on her looks, the strong one prefers raw power to persuasion, the nice one acquiesces too quickly, the responsible one sacrifices too much in the name of duty. Whose life are we living when decisive parts of it, imprinted during our formative years by people we love, have already been created for us? 

The good news is that we have the right to deprogram ourselves whenever we want. 

Our programming is only a problem when it becomes a life blocker. We consider trying something new—a U-turn in our career, a new haircut—then reject it with excuses such as “I’ve never been good at _______” or “It’s not me.” 

Until we (or someone else) challenge the validity of our excuses (“Says who?”), we cannot imagine imposing our will upon beliefs that we’ve come to accept as pure gospel. 

Our programming’s biggest impact is how proficiently it blinds us to our need to reject it.