Notice the Difference: Real Thoughts vs Old Automatic Thoughts

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, 
it will direct your life 
and you will call it fate.”

- Carl Jung

I learned very early in life that my Dad had a Chevy for the farm and a Chevy for his job. And so when the other farm boys at school would argue about Ford vs. Chevy, I knew what side I was on because the greatest, smartest, toughest man alive drove Chevy trucks.

Years later, Dad’s employer assigned him a Ford. It was a lot newer and I was happy for my dad, but told him it was too bad they gave him a stupid Ford truck.

“What’s wrong with Fords?” he asked a kid who could barely reach the brake pedal. 

“Because Chevys are better,” I said. 

“Who told you that?” he said. 

“You did!” I was certain.

“All the same to me.”

Well now I was stumped, because I thought HE had told me that. “If Chevys aren’t the best, why did you buy a Chevy?”

“Because when our old truck died, that brown Chevy was the cheapest truck I could find in Concordia.” The smartest, greatest, toughest man alive hadn’t chosen a Chevy for any irrefutable reason, it was simply the cheapest truck in a small town on the day he needed a new truck. My ironclad loyalty was built on nothing.

And the story gets even dumber. Years later, I was about to make my first big purchase with my newlywed wife. We went to the car lot to test drive a Chevy … but a brand-new Ford Fusion caught her eye and she fell in love. And my stupid brain subconsciously treated this as proof that my new bride didn’t respect my family, which made me both quietly angry and sad. I was defensive, and cited stats about why the Chevy would be better. She picked up that something was off, and she questioned why I hated Ford so much. And then I remembered: My dad doesn’t care about Chevy v. Ford, so I didn’t need to argue this. And my wife wasn’t disrespecting my family, so I didn’t need to be hurt about that. My reaction was coming from old automatic thoughts.

All of us have these automatic thoughts. They start forming in childhood, in moments we barely remember, and they quietly steer our mood and decisions every day.

Why did I get angry at that car? 

Why do certain foods gross me out? 

Why do I get a bad feeling about a coworker? 

Some of your automatic thoughts are very helpful: your brain’s subconscious is so quick and is constantly scanning for potential danger. But sometimes they’re leftovers from old experiences, bad data, or assumptions we never meant to pick up.

For example, my first reaction is to avoid salads with tomatoes. Why? Because 26 years ago, my siblings got food poisoning blamed on the tomatoes on a salad at a K-State dining hall. That’s the whole reason. My brain stored it as gospel.

Our teens do this, too, but based on less data in their young lives and sometimes with more heightened (yet perhaps more strongly suppressed) emotions. They may not know why they react the way they do. And when they feel their autonomy or reputation is threatened, they may switch to defense mode and not reflective mode. 

Just like athletes practice skills during calm moments, students need repeated practice identifying their thoughts when the stakes are low. That’s how they learn to ask:

Why am I mad?

Why am I anxious?

Why do I feel like a failure today?

I recently saw a comment from a Chiefs fan feeling depressed this season, and asking older fans how they survived the bad years. But why should the Chiefs losing impact our mood when we are with friends and family? The Chiefs, a collection of players from coast to coast who are paid to spend the season in Kansas City, lost the game … not us. Their success or failure doesn’t say anything about our worth.

Helping our teens notice the difference between real thoughts and old automatic thoughts is a powerful skill. When we teach them to pause, question their emotions, and make the unconscious conscious, we give them the freedom Jung described - the freedom to live intentionally rather than being quietly steered by old assumptions.