Changing Lens: Adapting experiences through cognitive flexibility

Human adaptive capacity is increasingly understood as an important element of human flourishing and sustainability and yet the question of how we cultivate the capacities for transformation and human flourishing remains. Being able to adapt what has happened and integrate it into new ways is an aspect of psychological flexibility. As cognitive neuroscience researcher Stanislas Dehaene puts it: "whatever we become aware of becomes available to drive our decision and our intentional actions, giving rise to the feeling that they are 'under control'."

Before a person can do that, however, they must actually feel and consciously access the thoughts and emotions so that they can navigate them in new ways. This process of expanding awareness engages something called cognitive flexibility. Activating the neural circuits involved in that process allows someone to get 'unstuck' from the self-referential and repetitive rumination about the event. As the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science explains, "psychological flexibility means contacting the present moment fully as a conscious human being, and based on what the situation affords, changing or persisting in behavior in the service of chosen values."

Two key ways this happens are through expanding one's awareness to include:

—A longer time horizon than just that specific moment in time. Through this expansion, a person is able to see other events that may have led up to that incident.

—Other interconnected nodes and systems. Doing this expands the view that the event is not only about that specific person — it recognizes other players that have interacted before that moment and it examines the role that all those interactions may have had on the actions of that person.

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest of souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars — Khalil Gibran

Dr. Jennifer Kai Lynne developed the Engaged Identity Approach to provide a framework for how we enact and embody identity, complexity, and adaptability. As a practice, it works to build the adaptive capacity of individuals and support identity expansion in order to decrease feelings of identity threat and gain greater cognitive flexibility. Grounded in identity theory, complexity science, and contemplative practice, the Engaged Identity Approach (EIA) offers a holistic process to engage mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional aspects of identity and how we make meaning.

The capacities for awareness, adaptability, and a sense of connection are not only flexible, they can simultaneously access the circuitry from the past while also activating new, more complex perspectives for putting past situations into new perspectives. Cognitive flexibility is only a part of human adaptability. By taking an embodied approach to our wellbeing, we can cultivate a deeper recognition of the lens we use to view past, present, and future. It's this broader awareness that serves to not only connect, but to heal.