How Honesty Can Help You Overcome Bad Habits

A Scientifically-Backed Article On The Power of Honesty

Recently I’ve been reading the New York Times Best Seller, Dopamine Nation by Dr Anna Lembke. In it, Dr Lembke dives into the role are actions have on dopamine levels in our brain, the addictive potential of such actions, and their subsequent tendency to cause us both pleasure and pain.

There are several highlights to the book but one area that stuck out to me this morning when reading was the role honesty plays in breaking free from bad habits.

We all would like to assume we’re pretty honest people, I’m sure, but our bad habits — in whatever form they take — are largely up-kept by the dishonest words we have with ourselves. For example, I tell myself a couple tokes on someone’s vape isn’t going to cause me harm when in reality I have a backlog of memories that tell me a hit of nicotine is only going to make me momentarily sick and take away the mental clarity I had before.

In these moments, I’m focused on the feeling of reward that comes with taking a hit of nicotine, over my own knowledge of what comes after. You could say in this moment I’m being partly-dishonest with myself. Lying to myself about the full picture of what something may do to me, in order to secure the reward.

Dr Lembke goes further with this and dives into the neurobiology of bad habits — which are essentially acute or chronic addictions — . It turns out honesty may arise from a part of our brain separate to where our compulsive impulses arise.

I wanted to dive into the neurobiology of honesty today, with help from Dr. Lembke’s book to explain this further. In understanding that honesty potentially arises from a different brain area than those that govern our motivational impulses — i.e, our desires to do something — , we can practice honesty to pull us away from such desires. Essentially deactivating our reward-driven brain in favour of radical self honesty.

Honesty and Reward: Two Brain Areas

Studies on addiction have long pointed to the limbic system, a set of structures deep within the brain, as being the area where our impulsive desires arise. Think of the pack of sweets you really want to eat despite being on a diet — the limbic system is where the urge to eat the sweets comes from. Dopamine exerts much of it’s effect in the generation of this desire, with studies on mice with depleted dopamine in this brain area showing little to no motivation to eat, or do anything worth value. Hence this work is central to a book called “Dopamine Nation”.

Thankfully, to stop us becoming uncontrollably addicted to the things that give us pleasure, our brains evolved our prefrontal cortex to govern and exert control over “deep brain” impulses. The site of executive function, one study noted, “The prefrontal cortex (PFC) intelligently regulates our thoughts, actions and emotions through extensive connections with other brain regions”.

Essentially, our prefrontal cortex allows us the ability to see urges come up from other brain areas and think “Hmmm, do I really need to do that? How has doing this thing impacted me in the past? Did it really help me?”. It helps us see the big picture, beyond our primal urges that just say “I WANT THAT”.

You could say that it’s function gives us full transparency and honesty as to the impacts of our behaviours and repercussions. Dr Lambke references a study from neuroscientist Christian Ruff who, through transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), stimulated prefrontal cortex activation in individuals who were being asked to lie or tell the truth during a task that provided monetary reward for lying. He concluded,

“Cheating was substantial but decreased by more than one-half during transcranial direct current stimulation over the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex” — M.A,Marachel., et al, Increasing honesty in humans with noninvasive brain stimulation.

What this study means? That being more honest is associated with increased activation in our prefrontal cortex. How? Through diverting our attention away from our limbic system, whose focus is solely on the reward, giving us a more objective, reasonable view to making a decision.

To note: Addicted individuals are thought to have a disregulated functioning of their prefrontal cortex, with decreased connections to areas like the limbic system. As such, they have a hindered ability to stop themselves from doing something, even if it’s harmful to themselves and those around them. They are also often compulsive liars.

How This Can Relate To You

All of us have our own addictions. I fear the term “addiction” has been pigeon-holed under the umbrella of chronic substance or alcohol abuse that devestates families and the individuals health. Addictions can be more subtle. In short, if you can’t stop yourself from doing something, despite it causing you harm — even if it’s acute harm — , you are addicted. Any place where you lack free will is a potential addiction that we need to recognise.

In order for us to be more honest with ourselves we need to see the bigger picture, and our prefrontal cortex seems to help with this. In Dr.Lambke’s book she recounts a number of her patients experiences of becoming more honest and theorises their improving management of bad behaviours is down to them becoming more honest.

Have you ever noticed how verbalising how you feel feels good and adds a bit of clarity to your thoughts? It’s as if being radically self honest opens us up to the realities that we’re otherwise trying to suppress. This is why having practices where you can speak openly and honestly to other people — like therapist, coaches or good friends — are so effective. Creative outlets, like writing for me, also serve as spaces for us to purge our mental chatter and be more honest with ourselves.

Our minds are busy places being pulled left and right by a plethora of different impulses. When I don’t write for a while it’s as if I can feel myself getting heavier from the weight of my thoughts — some I’m avoiding — .

This is your initiative to start practicing more honesty. It’ll not only help you overcome your bad habits but also build strong character.

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