The ‘Walking Hypocrites’...
Why We're Not as In Control as We Think
The uncomfortable truth about cognitive control in behavioral health organizations
I'm about to say something that might make you uncomfortable, yet, for the sake of honesty, many of us are unknowingly ‘walking hypocrites.’
Before you stop reading, hear me out. This isn't a judgment—it's neuroscience, and it explains everything from why wellness programs aren't working to why employer turnover rates remain stubbornly high.
The Illusion We All Live
We act as if we have our acts together. We go to work believing we're managing ourselves, emotions checked at the door, rational decisions flowing from our prefrontal cortex. We pride ourselves on being professional, controlled, thoughtful leaders.
Here's the uncomfortable truth: this has very little to do with our cognitive control.
Regardless of what we tell ourselves, we're operating with the neuroplasticity of habit—automatic reactions that fire faster than conscious thought. We're not making decisions; our neural patterns are making them for us.
The "Buy Button" in Your Brain
Neuromarketers have known this for decades. They don't target your rational mind—they target your automaticity. They study your purchasing patterns to determine the best way to trigger that "buy button" of yours without you realizing a decision has already been made for you.
Think about your last impulse purchase. You may have rationalized it; told yourself logical reasons for why you needed it. Yet, the decision happened in milliseconds, driven by ninja-like automatic neural patterns which bypassed your conscious control entirely.
The very mechanism that makes you buy things you don't need is the same one driving decisions in your workplace every single day.
The Automaticity of Leaving
Here's where this gets particularly relevant for behavioral health organizations: that clinician who just submitted their resignation? They think they made a rational, empowered decision to "take control of their life."
But what if I told you that leaving was just another automatic reaction, wired into their neural patterns long before they ever set foot in your facility?
The decision to walk away when unhappy is neurologically ‘primed.’ This is the exact fight-or-flight response that kept our ancestors alive—when the environment feels threatening, escape. While reactions like this served them well when encountering a deadly animal or environmental catastrophe, it's less than helpful when faced with organizational challenges that could be resolved with an attentive response rather than an automatic reaction.
The Hypocrite in All of Us
This is where the hypocrisy reveals itself: We're behavioral health professionals. We help people recognize their triggers, to choose wisely, and respond rather than react. Yet we ourselves are operating from the very automaticity we're trying to help others recover from.
We teach clients about mindfulness while our own minds quietly run on autopilot. We discuss emotional regulation while our emotions stimulate habitual reactions. We facilitate recovery while operating from the very same survival energy that admitted clients into our facility.
This isn't failure—it's misunderstood humanity. But it is hypocritical in the truest sense: we're not practicing what we're preaching because we don't realize we're not in control of our own actions.
The Neuroscience of Not Being in Charge
Your brain processes 11 million bits of information per second, but your conscious mind can only handle about 40. That means 99.999% of your mental processing happens below the threshold of awareness.
Those automatic reactions aren't bugs in the system—they're features. They allow you to function without having to consciously decide to breathe, blink, or maintain your heartbeat. But they also mean that most of your "decisions" are actually pattern recognition systems firing based on past experiences.
When your stress levels rise, when cortisol floods your system, when your ectopic olfactory receptors detect the cortisol in the room, your automatic systems take over even more completely. Conscious, cognitive control requires your attendance.
Why This Matters Beyond the Workplace
The implications reach far beyond your organization. If we're not in cognitive control, what are we teaching our children and grandchildren? How are we modeling conscious choice-making when we're not actually making conscious choices?
Every automatic reaction we have in the workplace ripples outward. Our unconscious stress responses affect our families. Our pattern-driven decisions influence the next generation. Our neurobiological hyper reactivity gives birth to their learned normal.
This is why recovering cognitive control isn't just about reducing turnover—it's about breaking generational patterns of surviving with intentional attention.
The Path Back to True Control
Here's the hopeful part: cognitive control can be recovered. But it requires something most wellness programs miss entirely—neurobiological recalibration that addresses the automatic systems running the show.
True cognitive control isn't about willpower or positive thinking. It's about:
Recognizing the automaticity: Understanding that most of our actions are aligned with habitual reactions rather than the moment.
Addressing the neurobiological root: Supporting the nervous system's ability to regulate itself rather than using consciousness to escape our humanity.
Creating space between stimulus and response: Developing the neurobiological capacity to pause, observe, and craft a win / win / win.
Elevating from survival to Being consciousness: Operating from the observer mind that can witness our humanity rather than being directed by it.
What True Cognitive Control Looks Like
When behavioral health professionals recover cognitive control, they don't just make better workplace decisions—they transform every area of their life.
They can recognize when their "buy button" is being pushed and select their response. They can feel the impulse to leave when things get difficult and pause to consider whether conscious problem-solving might serve better than an automatic escape.
Most importantly, they can model true choice-making for their clients, friends and family by breaking the cycle of unconscious reactivity and experiencing more pleasure and freedom.
The Uncomfortable Question
So here's the question we need to ask ourselves: If we're not in cognitive control of our own responses, how can we truly help others gain control of theirs?
The answer isn't to beat ourselves up for being ‘hypocrites.’ It's to recognize that recovering cognitive control is THE foundational work—for ourselves, our organizations, and the lives we touch.
Beyond Managing Symptoms
This is why traditional approaches to workplace wellness miss the mark. They assume we have cognitive control and just need better tools to manage stress. But you can't manage what you're not consciously aware of, and you can't consciously control what's happening automatically.
Instead of managing symptoms of automaticity, we need to address the neurobiological patterns producing them. Instead of trying harder to be in control, we need to understand why we're not and work with the systems actually running the show.
The Ripple Effect of True Control
When behavioral health professionals develop real cognitive control—not the illusion of it, but the neurobiological capacity for conscious leadership—the impact extends far beyond reduced turnover.
They become models of conscious living for their clients. They break generational patterns of reactivity. They contribute to organizational cultures based on awareness rather than automatic reaction.
They transform from ‘walking hypocrites’ into empowered examples of what human beings can generate when true choice is acted upon rather repeating neurobiological programming.
The Choice We Actually Have
We may not be as in control as we think, but we do have one crucial choice: the choice to recognize our automaticity and work to reclaim our cognitive control.
This choice isn't about perfection—it's about awareness. It's about understanding that the path to helping others recover begins with our own cognitive recovery.
It's about bringing Being back into the building, where conscious leadership happens.
What automatic patterns are running your life without you realizing it? What would become possible if you could pause, observe, and consciously choose your responses rather than being maneuvered by unconscious reactions?
The answers to these questions could transform not just your workplace, but every relationship, every decision, and every moment of your life.
Because when we choose to be conscious leaders we are being generous. We are closing the door on ‘walking hypocrites’ and generating the change we wish to see in the world.