Quit Before You Get Used To It
There’s a widely known theory about the brain. If exposed to the same stimuli over a period of time, the brain accepts it as the new normal and creates resistance to changing the situation. This process is called neural adaptation or sensory adaptation, characterised by a decrease in responsiveness to a consistent or repetitive stimulus.
However, not all situations should be adapted to. Domestic abuse, toxic work environments, and harmful substances are all situations that require us to take heed and take flight.
For instance, if you enter a room with a strong odor, you may notice it initially, but over time, your sense of smell adapts and the smell becomes less noticeable.
Likewise, if you’re in a situation that is less than desirable for your mental, physical, and emotional health, it takes your brain a limited time to fight against such impulses disrupting your survival. In other words, your brain sends signals to you to flee. If you stick to the situation, your brain starts to recognise it as your new normal and makes every attempt to adjust.
This adjustment normalises the situation for you, making it much harder to do anything concrete about it, and so your brain instead transmits those toxic feelings into poison in your mind, body and spirit.
There are exceptional situations where you should fight rather than choose flight, however, these situations would generally be positive experiences, with slight changes that require you to leave your comfort zone. Your experience would be primed by intrinsic motivators like satisfaction, the appearance of growth, and success. These would be real and actionable in the immediate short term, and not harmful to more than one part of you — physical, mental, financial, emotional, or spiritual — giving positive rewards for the hardship you endure, and justifying the brain adjustment.
A lot of these situations are the opposite of this case, and the risk we face is forcing ourselves to go through it in case it gets better over time.
Here’s some advice. It won’t.
Get out while you still can. When the negativity of a repeated experience is a burden on your mind, body, and spirit, run for the hills.
A useful tip: While the experience is fresh in your mind, journal it somewhere. Use this as your golden compass when your brain is starting to adjust.
Things rarely ever get better over time. Instead, they tend to intensify in the initial direction. Instead of hoping for potential, consider that there’s often a better partner, relationship, job, or habit that is a better fit for you. If you don’t leave, you may as well be digging a hole for yourself that may be very hard to get out of.
In this world, we’ve been taught to dwell on scarcity and lost opportunities, but the opposite is true. There is only abundance if you dare to seek it yourself.
Lose the deadweight and get out now. Send that resignation letter, end that relationship, quit that habit. Get out as fast as you can.
And once you have, follow my newsletter — Unfiltered, for more intimate ideas and real stories that may prompt you to see the world differently.
