Habits Of My Own

When people are tired, sad, lonely or even happy, they turn to comfort food. Everyone has their own personal, favorite comfort food. For me, it is Jack in the Box tacos. If you actually ate this food as an adult, you would never eat it again! But for some strange reason, you are still drawn to the food, it seems completely illogical

In reality the logic is simple, you have an emotional attachment to the food you are eating. I can justify eating my favorite tacos because I think it will make me feel happy, content or calm, I am guessing you feel the same way about your food. You know the food is not good for you, but subconsciously you think it will. After a while you begin to believe the food will make you feel better and because our mind believes this, you do feel better, but the effect is short lived.

After a few bites, guilt kicks in. However this doesn't stop me from finishing my first taco, or even my second. I know you know this feeling and it can be frustrating. I know I should not be eating this greasy, oddly textures taco but at the same time I really feel like eating it! I like you have the craving, desire, longing, and urge to devour that taco!

Annihilating the taco, is a habit and this habit was learned through different ways. For me, I remember being very young, seven or eight years old maybe. I was on the way to the beach in Southern California with my family. I remember my mom and aunt, talking about Jack in the Box tacos. They talked about how good and greasy they are. They would especially be perfect to buy and take to the beach to eat. We were all happy and having a good time. It was a warm, sunny day at the beach, and we were going to play and enjoy ourselves. We got the tacos and they were the most delicious tacos in the world. I remember some gritty sand getting onto some of my taco but it didn't matter, we were having a fantastic day. Important memories which are vivid typically are more influential than the everyday mundane memories.

Even today, just the thought of getting a taco from Jack in the Box triggers good feelings which are associated with the memory. Sometimes the actual memory comes with it and sometimes it does not. It is important to understand how we relate feelings to different things in our lives, things like food, music or a voice.

Aerosmith was my favorite band of all time. I would listen to their songs over and over again, and never get sick of them. All this changed in the 90's when I took my then girlfriend to an Aerosmith concert. Things did not get well and since then I don't care for their music, each song reminds me of her which turns me off to their music. This is just another example of how memories can influence simple things in our lives.

It's SoCal, the 70's, my family has a van with pin stripes, and the interior was tangerine orange with matching carpet. Yes it makes me laugh too! I was about six years old and encountered a large black widow spider in this van. My parents made me and my brothers' get out of the van quickly. For years I had an embarrassing fear of spiders. I was able to link it to this memory. I am now able to kill spiders, but if I see a big one I still get nervous, but nothing like it use to be.

Other memories we associate with feelings or emotions might be something as simple as a voice. I don't know about you, but whenever I hear a stern voice, like my wife saying, Patrick Michael Glancy, I know I have either done something wrong or need to find something to do and fast! Most people feel like a child when they hear this tone of voice. Especially when someone uses your first, middle and last name!

Enough about me. The point of all this is to show you common sense examples of learned behaviors. Emotions associated with memories trigger very powerful, behind the scenes reactions and decisions in our minds.