Tabula Rasa

Clean­ing up Your Men­tal Frame­works to Improve Deci­sion-Mak­ing

Damásio’s The­o­ry of Somat­ic Mark­ers (Part III)

In the first part of this series, we explored the emo­tion­al aspects of deci­sion-mak­ing and intro­duced Damásio’s hypoth­e­sis of somat­ic mark­ers. These mark­ers, formed through asso­cia­tive learn­ing, help us nav­i­gate deci­sions by link­ing past expe­ri­ences to emo­tion­al and phys­i­o­log­i­cal respons­es. Think of these as “sen­so­ry images”, or men­tal frame­works that orga­nize emo­tions, per­cep­tions, thoughts, and phys­i­cal sen­sa­tions into a kind of inter­nal fil­ing sys­tem. Imag­ine your brain cat­e­go­riz­ing events into “index cards” and stor­ing them in men­tal “draw­ers” under spe­cif­ic labels. For exam­ple, if you’ve had a neg­a­tive expe­ri­ence giv­ing a pub­lic speech, your sen­so­ry images might include a crowd­ed room, stuffy air, your voice crack­ing, laugh­ter from the audi­ence, and a rac­ing heart­beat. These ele­ments might get stored under the label: “Pub­lic speak­ing is dan­ger­ous.” It doesn’t mat­ter if this describes real­i­ty; your brain, your emo­tions and phys­i­o­log­i­cal sen­sa­tions cre­at­ed this scheme, and you accept­ed it as real. When faced with a sim­i­lar sit­u­a­tion, your brain retrieves this label and the stored infor­ma­tion, trig­ger­ing fear and phys­i­o­log­i­cal respons­es like a rapid heart­beat. These phys­i­o­log­i­cal and emo­tion­al reac­tions serve as somat­ic mark­ers remind­ing you of the “dan­ger” you might expe­ri­ence. While this mech­a­nism is designed to aid quick deci­sion-mak­ing with­out the need to con­scious­ly ana­lyze the sit­u­a­tion, it can also hold you back, espe­cial­ly when mark­ers are based on unpro­duc­tive or dis­tort­ed expe­ri­ence. This can lead to the avoid­ance of sit­u­a­tions and tasks which could oth­er­wise help you to self-actu­al­ize and improve your career chances [3] [4].

In the sec­ond part of this series, we dis­cussed step 1 and tech­niques that help you to iden­ti­fy sen­so­ry images. Now, we will explore how to active­ly reshape the con­tents of your “draw­ers,” enabling health­i­er and more pro­duc­tive deci­sion-mak­ing.

Step 2: Chang­ing Your “Index Cards” and Somat­ic Mark­ers

To mod­i­fy sen­so­ry images and somat­ic mark­ers, you need to address per­cep­tions, cog­ni­tion, emo­tions, and phys­i­o­log­i­cal respons­es holis­ti­cal­ly. There are sev­er­al meth­ods which can be applied to change what you think, what you feel and what you expe­ri­ence on a phys­i­o­log­i­cal lev­el. These tech­niques are drawn from psy­cho­log­i­cal ther­a­py and prac­ti­cal approach­es but are adapt­able to every­day life.

Refram­ing

Refram­ing is also known as cog­ni­tive restruc­tur­ing. It is a tech­nique root­ed in cog­ni­tive ther­a­py. It is attrib­uted to psy­chother­a­pists Albert Ellis, Aaron T. Beck and Vir­ginia Satir. It involves con­scious­ly think­ing about and then rein­ter­pret­ing a sit­u­a­tion. In part 2 you learned in step 1 how to acknowl­edge your beliefs, thoughts, emo­tions and bod­i­ly reac­tions linked to sit­u­a­tion of impor­tance (we worked with the exam­ple: giv­ing a pub­lic speech) and wrote them down. With the refram­ing tech­nique you learn how to focus on pos­i­tive aspects of a sce­nario while reg­u­lat­ing your emo­tions and reduc­ing stress [1].

How to use Refram­ing

You can start by cre­at­ing a table where you record every­thing you’ve dis­cov­ered about your thoughts, emo­tions, and phys­i­o­log­i­cal respons­es. Aim to express each ele­ment as a clear sen­tence:

Orig­i­nal thought/ belief, emo­tion and reac­tion of your body
Thought	“I will embar­rass myself by stut­ter­ing and slip­ping up!”
Emo­tion	“I feel the fear!”
Body reac­tion	“I have sweaty hands, and a rac­ing heart­beat!”

Con­scious­ly shift your per­spec­tive. Replace neg­a­tive inter­pre­ta­tions with pos­i­tive or neu­tral ones. This process can already lead to feel­ing relief and a reduc­tion in stress and ten­sion, with­out work­ing on phys­i­o­log­i­cal sen­sa­tions direct­ly.

Reframed thought/ belief, emo­tion and reac­tion of your body
Thought	“I am excit­ed to do the speech. The audi­ence will see my stut­ter as enthu­si­asm and pos­i­tive agi­ta­tion!”
Emo­tion	“I can feel excite­ment!”
Body reac­tion	“My sweaty hands and heart­beat show I’m ener­gized.!”

You can trick your brain into inter­pret­ing the sit­u­a­tion which you fear as a pos­i­tive excite­ment. If you imag­ine your­self stand­ing on a div­ing plat­form, right before the jump, you will have the same phys­i­o­log­i­cal reac­tions but a dif­fer­ent inter­pre­ta­tion. Tell your­self “I am excit­ed!” and link your phys­i­o­log­i­cal acti­va­tion to this idea. Your emo­tion will shift and at that point you can cre­ate a new sen­so­ry image. Remem­ber, refram­ing is like build­ing a mus­cle, it takes con­sis­tent prac­tice to see results.

Visu­al­iza­tion

By imag­in­ing a sit­u­a­tion (giv­ing a speech) and pos­i­tive out­comes (see­ing an excit­ed audi­ence), you can rewrite your sen­so­ry images and cre­ate empow­er­ing asso­ci­a­tions. Visu­al­iza­tion tech­niques can use the brain’s abil­i­ty to not only imag­ine a sit­u­a­tion, but also to visu­al­ize it so vivid­ly that they are expe­ri­enced as though they are real. But instead of let­ting past expe­ri­ences dic­tate the script, you will write it your­self and direct it. This makes the method a pow­er­ful tool for redesign­ing your sen­so­ry images, as well as the emo­tion­al and phys­i­o­log­i­cal respons­es. It can enhance moti­va­tion and help you to self-improve. This exer­cise will guide you step-by-step to visu­al­ize a suc­cess­ful pub­lic speak­ing expe­ri­ence, but you can also rewrite it to fit oth­er sit­u­a­tions and spe­cif­ic per­son­al chal­lenges.

1. Sit com­fort­ably in a qui­et place where you can relax with­out dis­trac­tions. Close your eyes and take three slow, deep breaths, let­ting your body set­tle into a calm and focused state.
2. Imag­ine your­self stand­ing on a stage or in front of an audi­ence. Visu­al­ize the room: the light­ing, the seat­ing arrange­ment, and the atten­tive faces of the audi­ence. Notice the details (per­haps a micro­phone, a podi­um, or the feel­ing of the floor beneath your feet).
3. Pic­ture the audi­ence smil­ing and nod­ding in agree­ment as you speak. Hear their warm applause at the end. Feel the ener­gy of con­nec­tion and approval flow­ing through the room.
4. As you deliv­er your speech, imag­ine the pride, excite­ment, and con­fi­dence you feel. Let these emo­tions fill you com­plete­ly. Notice how your body responds — per­haps with a slight, ener­giz­ing tin­gling sen­sa­tion or a calm, steady heart­beat.
5. Before you fin­ish, focus on one key pos­i­tive image or feel­ing from your visu­al­iza­tion, such as the audience’s applause or the warmth of your con­fi­dence. Men­tal­ly “book­mark” this image or sen­sa­tion so you can recall it when­ev­er need­ed.

Open your eyes and take a moment to reflect on the pos­i­tive ener­gy you’ve cre­at­ed. Remem­ber, this exer­cise is not just prepa­ra­tion for pub­lic speak­ing, it’s a way to train your brain to approach sim­i­lar chal­lenges with con­fi­dence and calm. Repeat this visu­al­iza­tion reg­u­lar­ly to strength­en your pos­i­tive sen­so­ry images and emo­tion­al asso­ci­a­tions.

The more you can asso­ciate your visu­al­iza­tion with per­son­al mean­ing and indi­vid­ual cues, the bet­ter it will work [2]. Prac­tice this exer­cise reg­u­lar­ly to rein­force pos­i­tive sen­so­ry images and emo­tion­al respons­es. This tech­nique is not just prepa­ra­tion for pub­lic speak­ing but also a way to train your brain to approach sim­i­lar chal­lenges with calm and con­fi­dence.

Reg­u­lat­ing Your Phys­i­o­log­i­cal Reac­tions:

There are sev­er­al meth­ods which most­ly work by down reg­u­lat­ing your bod­i­ly acti­va­tion. When mod­i­fy­ing your sen­so­ry images this will aid you in the moment you will actu­al­ly give your speech. You don’t want your phys­i­o­log­i­cal reac­tion to be too low. Accord­ing to the Yerkes-Dod­son law your per­for­mance will reach a peak with increased men­tal and phys­i­cal arousal. If acti­va­tion gets too high or too low your per­for­mance decreas­es. The fol­low­ing exer­cis­es can help you by serv­ing pri­mar­i­ly as stress man­age­ment exer­cis­es as they will induce a parasym­pa­thet­ic response:

• Cycled Breath­ing: Inhale through your nose and count to four, hold your breath and count to four, and then exhale through your mouth as long and slow­ly as pos­si­ble.
• Cold Expo­sure: Give your body a short cold “shock”, either by an ice cube to your tem­ples or put your wrists under very cold water. It will calm you down.
• Pro­gres­sive Mus­cle Relax­ation: Tense a group of mus­cles (e.g. your hands), hold for a few sec­onds, and then release. Feel the relax­ation that fol­lows

Remem­ber to inter­pret a slight­ly raised heart­beat as excite­ment. It can serve as a per­for­mance enhancer.

Addi­tion­al Tips:

Learn to “step back” from thoughts and view them as just thoughts rather than facts. For exam­ple, instead of think­ing “I will give a ter­ri­ble speech”, reframe it as “I’m hav­ing the thought that I will be giv­ing a ter­ri­ble speech”. It is a tech­nique that is drawn from Accep­tance and Com­mit­ment Ther­a­py. It is a method which might be espe­cial­ly use­ful in the begin­ning of your refram­ing expe­ri­ence, where you might have a hard time to reframe com­plete­ly. You can apply this as a small­er step.

If you expe­ri­ence your­self as already over­whelmed, pause imme­di­ate­ly so that you can pre­vent to add anoth­er lay­er of unhelp­ful sen­so­ry images. Prac­tice the fol­low­ing tech­nique and keep it in place when­ev­er you feel you lose con­trol over the sit­u­a­tion:

STOP Method:

Stop, Take a Breath, Observe, Proceed: Pause when you feel over­whelmed to assess the sit­u­a­tion calm­ly before respond­ing. This method was devel­oped by Jon Kabat-Zinn in Dialec­ti­cal Behav­ior Ther­a­py and serves to reg­u­late emo­tions and reduce stress. But it can help beyond ther­a­peu­tic set­tings.

Bring­ing It All Togeth­er

To effec­tive­ly reshape your sen­so­ry images, inte­grate these tech­niques. For exam­ple, cou­ple a reframed thought with a vivid visu­al­iza­tion, induce a pos­i­tive mood with music, and prac­tice a breath­ing tech­nique. Reg­u­lar­ly work­ing with these meth­ods will strength­en your abil­i­ty to approach chal­leng­ing deci­sions with con­fi­dence and calm. Remem­ber, dis­com­fort at the start is natural—growth often requires step­ping out­side your com­fort zone. Over time, you’ll notice these exer­cis­es trans­form­ing your deci­sion-mak­ing and empow­er­ing you to say “yes” to oppor­tu­ni­ties that pre­vi­ous­ly seemed daunt­ing.

Ref­er­ences

[1] Beck, A. T. (1976). Cog­ni­tive ther­a­py and the emo­tion­al dis­or­ders. New York: Inter­na­tion­al Uni­ver­si­ties Press.

[2] Cum­ming, J., & Williams, S.E. (2013). Intro­duc­ing the revised applied mod­el of delib­er­ate imagery use for sport, dance, exer­cise, and reha­bil­i­ta­tion. Move­ment & Sport Sci­ences, 82, 69–81. http://dx.doi.org/10.3917/sm.082.0069

[3] Dama­sio, A. R. (1994). Descartes’ Error: Emo­tion, Rea­son, and the Human Brain. New York: Avon Books.

[4] Dama­sio A. R. (1996). The somat­ic mark­er hypoth­e­sis and the pos­si­ble func­tions of the pre­frontal cor­tex. Philo­soph­i­cal trans­ac­tions of the Roy­al Soci­ety of Lon­don. Series B, Bio­log­i­cal sci­ences, 351(1346), 1413–1420. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1996.0125

[5] Mel­low­bag & Fre­un­deskreis ft. Gen­tle­man. (1998) — Tab­u­la Rasa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIKKvG0_KdM