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Today, I am going to show you how to rewire your mind and break free from autopilot thinking so that you can reclaim purpose and agency.

Rewiring your mind is essential for escaping autopilot mode because the latter is primarily a matter of mindset.

Unfortunately, most people today never realise they live and work on autopilot, without meaning, purpose, or enjoyment. They lack the cognitive awareness and ability to change their mindset and upgrade their lives, work, or businesses.

Staying frozen and stuck in a shallow, unproductive mindset keeps them habitual when they should be shifting to intentional.

Even if they understand where they stand, their approach is focused on acquiring more hard or soft skills. This still has a limited impact on their mindset and their life.

By grounding intentional living in metaskills, metacognition, and high-order thinking, you can seek intellectual rigor and achieve transformative results.

Thinking is not enough anymore. You must upgrade to thinking about thinking so that you can shift from mindless routines to intentional learning, decision-making and problem-solving.

Thinking about your thinking is a crucial metaskill. It's no longer about technical or interpersonal skills. Investing in them won't help you escape autopilot and level up your life and work. To level up, you need to upgrade mentally with metaskills, metacognition and high-order thinking.

The Tyranny of Autopilot and the Promise of Cognitive Mastery

In Ancient Greece, rulers who exerted oppressive, harsh and unjust control over their people were called tyrants.

Autopilot works in the same way. When actions are automatic and not fully conscious, often driven by (bad) habits or routine (rather than thoughtful and deliberate decision-making), people lose control and agency, feeling trapped in a cycle of routine, with little or no room for change and growth.

They rely on selective memory, narrow viewpoints and overconfidence in what they know and can do (usually without ever doing them). Their perspective and mindset are limited, preventing them from exploring new experiences or learning opportunities, and missing out on growth and a richer life.

Autopilot thinking also leads to inefficiencies and errors due to unchecked assumptions and unexamined biases, leading to poor decision-making and outcomes.

If all that is not tyranny, then what is? The autopilot mode takes control of life and work. It gains absolute power and authority, oppressing people mentally and psychologically, suppressing their dreams and aspirations, undermining their health and well-being, and silencing any voice of reason and order.

Let's be honest: living and working on autopilot leads to enslavement and chaos.

To restore order and regain agency, you need a radical mindset shift. That shift can only occur if you level up your current state of mind. For that, you need to develop specific higher-order skills and competencies.

The Toolkit for Cognitive Liberation

Cognitive liberation is the process of breaking free from limiting and false beliefs, outdated thinking patterns, and cognitive biases.

It's about gaining mental freedom from internal or external barriers to independent thinking.

This is especially relevant and crucial today because of the immense influence and pressure from technology, media and societal expectations.

Imagine you are a bird trapped in a cage. As long as you are trapped in it, you believe it's all there is—just the cage. That's limiting your thinking and your options. Until one day you try to open that little door and voila! The door opens, you become free and start flying to explore the beautiful world out there.

Stop being the trapped bird. You must see there's more to life, work, and business than following predetermined paths others impose on you. Living and working on autopilot is not sustainable, and most people usually realise that very late (or sometimes, too late to make amends).

Relying on soft and hard skills is outdated. Technical skills are easy to learn today (a YouTube search is enough in many cases). Developing soft, interpersonal skills is also not enough anymore. It can help you build stronger relationships, but is that it? There's more to skills, and we now know.

Metaskills are higher-order skills that serve as the foundation for developing and applying other skills (the hard and soft ones, I just mentioned). They match our current needs for navigating uncertainty, constant change and adversity. Metaskills empower people to level up their learning, decision-making and problem-solving.

Self-awareness, adaptability and resilience are metaskills. Continuous learning and critical thinking are also metaskills. Strategic thinking and systems thinking, too. You can apply them to any life, work, or business domain.

What sets them apart from regular skills is that they are universal (so, not limited to one domain or discipline), cannot be taught, but can be developed through experience and personal growth, and are higher-order in nature.

But what is higher-order thinking? It's like being a detective of ideas. Instead of simply remembering something, like for example the name of a favourite book, you ask deeper questions, like:

• Why is it my favourite book?

• What makes it special compared to other books I've read?

• What positive influence or impact did reading that book have on me?

Imagine higher-order thinking as building with LEGO bricks. Copying a design and building a house with the bricks based on that design is lower-order thinking. You may also create your own design and figure out how to make it work. That's higher-order thinking.

And it can be applied to many broad domains in life, for example, knowledge and emotions.

In the cognitive domain, higher-order thinking is about

• Analysing (exploring relationships, causes and connections between things, ideas and concepts)

• Evaluating (making judgments based on sound analysis)

• Synthesising and creating something new

For example, active listening. When you simply remember that tip you read on LinkedIn, that's mere understanding. You recall the advice that it's important to listen actively. If you also understand why active listening is essential (to build deeper relationships, avoid misunderstandings and conflict, etc.), that's also good, but still lower-order thinking.

Going beyond that requires that you apply those tips in real-life situations (for example, when having a call with a prospective client), analyse communication styles (yours and others' to see what works best), evaluate your communication style and active listening (Has it improved your communication?), and create your own unique method for using active listening in the context of your interactions with other people. All that is higher-order thinking.

In the affective domain (emotions, attitudes, values and feelings), higher-order thinking goes beyond simple awareness and engagement. It involves:

• Valuing and attaching importance to what you experienced or felt

• Prioritising it in your life

• Making it a consistent part of who you are

For example, empathy. When talking to a client, you become aware that something bothers them or they are upset. You notice that feeling or vibe and engage with them by asking what's wrong and if you can help. That's good, but it's lower-order thinking. When you value empathy and understand it's vital in your life, that's the first step toward higher-order thinking. Prioritising it in your life and then making it an integral part of who you are are the final steps. That's a long process, from simple awareness to integration, but it leads you to higher-order thinking.

Let's synthesise more. We talked about metaskills and higher-order thinking and their value. Combining those two concepts leads us to metacognition, another crucial tool at your disposal.

Metacognition is a higher-order metaskill involving awareness, understanding, and regulating thought processes. Put simply, it's thinking about your thinking.

I would go as far as to claim that metacognition should be the foundation of contemporary learning, decision-making and problem-solving. It helps you reflect on your learning processes, identify your strong and weak points, and adopt more effective strategies for decision-making and problem-solving.

Metacognition is essentially being the boss of your brain, thinking about how you think and learn. It's like taking a road trip. You start by thinking about how you usually plan road trips. You realise that you often get overwhelmed by preparation and that having a to-do list helps your planning. You evaluate that strategy and consider what worked best with past road trips, what went wrong, and what you could improve.

If necessary, you adjust your plan by creating an online to-do list with reminders because a handwritten list fails to remind you of crucial details and timing. As you plan that road trip, you monitor the process and check whether the new approach works. You may further refine the process to adjust to new learnings and circumstances. After the trip, you reflect on what went well (planning-wise) and what didn't, and assess the impact of that new online to-do list on the trip and planning process as a whole. That's metacognition in action.

It's like having a personal coach inside your head constantly guiding you to improve your skills and strategies.

When planning a trip, you not only plan it but also consider how you plan it and improve the process if necessary. The same concept can be applied to any life, work, or business process or context. Bingo!

Breaking Autopilot: Immediate actions rooted in Metacognition

Living and working on autopilot is all about mindless routines, snap decisions, and instinctive responses, without questioning the deeper reasoning behind them. They can sometimes help (for example, in rapidly evolving situations or risky environments). But, most of the time, you don't need them.

In fact, they don't serve you because they hinder your growth. What if you could reflect on them and reshape them in a way that benefited you? That's where metacognition and metaskills come into play.

Here are 3 immediate tactics to regain control:

1. Mindful metacognition. Before responding instinctively or making a snap decision, pause for a cognitive check-in. Are you solving the right problem? Or are you simply responding without deeper analysis? Those moments of introspection create the space to assess whether your impulsive reaction aligns with your true intention. Applying the 5 Whys method can help you unveil why you instinctively do what you do and clarify whether your response is necessary or simply habitual.

2. High-order thinking in practice. People usually simplify choices into binary questions and dilemmas. Should I do X or Y? Should I say YES or NO? Those binary choices are never the most effective way to navigate life, work, and business. Remember what we said about higher-order thinking. Instead of oversimplifying things and polarising yourself (X or Y? Yes or No?), you can analyse and synthesise, creating new, more nuanced options. Instead of choosing between X and Y, you can combine the best from both options and develop a more beneficial solution. Blend elements in creative ways and approach decisions with a synthesis mindset. "Working from home as a solopreneur? Or working from an office?". It doesn't have to be the one or the other. It can be both. Working from home most of the week for deep focus work without distractions, and working from an office twice weekly to stimulate yourself and avoid isolation.

3. Metaskill activation. Metaskills are higher-order skills that help you apply lower-order skills (and choose when and how to use them). An effective way to activate them is by forcing yourself to approach any situation, issue or problem as a novice. Literally, ask yourself, "If I were a novice, how would I approach this?". We are often biased and slaves to our previous experience, habits and routines (that's how our brain works). Approaching everything with a fresh, unbiased perspective and curiosity can help you unlock hidden potential and innovative solutions to problems. Routines and habits take over in an instant. Fight back by giving more space to curiosity and forcing yourself to go about things as a newbie. For example, when preparing a sales pitch to a prospective client, you may approach it by going into their shoes, as they are totally unfamiliar with your service. How would they structure the presentation, and how would they explain the benefits? That mindset constantly opens curiosity loops, which fuel innovation and growth while pushing biases, routines and habits to the side.

Designing an Intentional Life with Systems Powered by Metaskills

Intentional living is not just about setting goals—there's much more to it. It's about designing systems that align and sync with those goals, as well as your purpose, values, and priorities. Metaskills can become the tools you can use to do precisely that: move beyond reactive living and shift from mindless to intentional.

Here are 3 proven ways to use them.

1. Clarify your purpose with High-Order Thinking. One of the most common problems people face is thinking limited to silos. Life, work, and business are not silos. They don't happen and evolve separately, but together. A meaningful life is one with intention and authenticity. This kind of life can be shaped by intentional intersections, that is, points where your life, work, and business touch upon each other and create a holistic approach and a sense of overall fulfilment. If you ask yourself isolated questions like "How is my career doing?" or "Am I successful in my love life or family?", chances are you will neglect important aspects and how all your life domains interact. Instead, ask yourself, "Does my career support my lifestyle?", "Is my work aligned with my personal values?", "Does my love life support my work?", "Is my business synced with my priorities?". Questions like these help you gain more clarity on where you stand and how you can improve certain domains of your life, work, or business that are identified as flawed. You can use the 3-Layer framework, where your business is at the innermost layer, work is the next layer, and your life (values and priorities) are the outermost layer. All those layers have to sync. Your business has to sync with how you work and your lifestyle. Your work and lifestyle have to sync with your life values and priorities.

2. Build metacognitive systems. Those are systems that approach thinking with structure and allow you to reflect on how you think so that you can improve. For example, if you’re a writer, a metacognitive system might involve reviewing past work with structured reflection, identifying thought patterns that lead to creativity blocks, and adjusting your workflow accordingly. A system is made of habits. However, mindless routines are not good habits, and no effective systems can be built on bad habits. You need to pair good habits with reflection and create feedback loops that enhance your self-awareness. For example, after a sales call with a prospective client, you may ask yourself, "What patterns did I notice?". Or after a creative session (any, be it graphic design or sculpting), ask yourself, "What strategies helped me generate ideas?". Every occasion or event is an opportunity for feedback and learning. This is why habit stacking with reflection can help identify gaps, blind spots, patterns, or even strong points (you can reinforce). To do that, stack reflection on any existing habit or established action. For example, you can pair reflection on your daily achievements and struggles with your evening tea. Or you can start your day with your morning coffee and a reflection on yesterday's productivity. By layering reflection into routine moments, you can build metacognitive systems effortlessly without missing out on impact.

3. Systems Thinking. This is especially important for solopreneurs. Time is the most precious resource because, unlike energy, focus and attention (your other three resources), time is finite and non-renewable. Once gone, it's gone. And you don't even know how much time you have left. So, instead of obsessing over your productivity (a term coined in another day and age, primarily for factory workers), you can focus on mental bandwidth. Systems thinking and automation can help you increase your mental bandwidth by limiting your daily tasks and decisions, or creating patterns and subsystems to help you execute faster (saving precious time). And again, all this is linked to higher-order thinking. The more systems and automation you use for lower-value tasks and decisions, the more clarity and bandwidth you are left with to focus on what matters the most. Instead of getting bogged down in repetitive execution, you can use systems to allow for higher-order thinking and growth. Decision templates are a precious (yet underestimated) tool that helped me immensely over time. As a champion overthinker, I spent a lot of time and energy on decision-making, even for the most trivial matters (for example, how to respond to a friend's message or a client's request). Creating and using a decision template helped me automate the process I used to decide (not the decision itself).

   For example, for tasks and projects, I use a decision template that looks like this:

• Task or project: what are the details, requirements and expectations?

• Value: routine work or high-impact activity?

• Automation potential: can it be delegated, streamlined or automated and how?

• Resources needed: how much time and effort does this require? How many and which tools are needed?

• Implementation: set up review checkpoints and start execution

Sustaining Growth by Cultivating Metacompetences

Metacompetences are a higher level of metaskills. Essentially, they are about knowing when and how to apply the metaskills. To sustain growth (after getting unstuck from autopilot mode) and avoid relapse, you need to leverage metacompetences. You must ensure your progress solidifies and does not collapse under the weight of inconsistency, bad habits, and addictions (of any kind and form).

Escaping autopilot is not a one-off. It's about staying free (not just breaking free from the cage I wrote at the beginning). It's not a long jump but a continuous climb. You must condition your mind to persevere despite constant change and adversity. You must ensure you evolve (in time and "space") and not just spin in a new hamster wheel chasing nothingness.

Here are 3 essential metacompetences to help you sustain freedom and growth.

1.Constraint challenges. They are about the deliberate practice of metaskills. Creativity is one of them. But creativity not defined in the old, static way (as something elitist for the select few artists and "geniuses)" but as a broad cognitive process that involves learning and problem-solving. Constraint challenges train your mental muscles and stretch your ability to think beyond the obvious (usually defined by your previous life on autopilot). An effective constraint challenge is trying to solve a complex problem you face with only three resources - no more. For example, launch a new product or service with zero budget. This will force ingenuity and prevent you from relying on convenience (i.e. paid ads). If you don't challenge your creativity, you will always fall back on the same old, easy solutions. But those old, easy solutions rarely lead or sustain growth.

2.Cognitive retrospectives. Introspection and reflection are frequently mentioned when talking about escaping autopilot and growing. You can't break free, explore and grow without them because you will repeat the same mistakes. Most people live with the illusion that progress comes with time. That's far from reality. Time may pass, but you can't go far without conscious, deliberate thoughts, decisions, and actions. Reflection can get you far. Set up and perform weekly cognitive retrospectives by asking yourself:

1. What decisions did I make this week?

2. What data and assumptions shaped those decisions?

3. Were they reactive or proactive?

4. Did I make mistakes and what did I learn from those mistakes?

Repetition is not progress or growth. To recalibrate your decision-making, it's essential to do that simple but powerful exercise to unveil your thinking patterns, biases, judgments, inefficiencies, and habits.

3.High-order thinking in conflict. Autopilot calls for conflict aversion. That's a trap because conflict is unavoidable. And it doesn't mean putting up fights with everyone every day. Conflict is inevitable because you simply can't agree with everything. So do others. Disagreement should not be treated as a battle. That flawed mindset presents another binary choice: defend or attack? Conflict is not (should not be) about winning or losing. The space between those two extremes is where most growth happens. The best breakthroughs take place between differing opinions and perspectives. Instead of finding excuses and ways to divide, you must create a mindset that allows you to synthesise. That's a vital metacompetence that helps you leverage conflict for growth, not just resolve it. The following 3 questions can help you refram conflict and make the most out of it:

1. What are the assumptions (often false) we are operating under?

2. What are our shared values?

3. How can this conflict lead to something greater?

Then, as part of the feedback loops for metacognition, you set aside 5 minutes afterward and reflect on your approach.

• Were you reactive or strategic?

• What were your false assumptions?

• How can you improve next time the same conflict arises?

High-order thinking demands that you go beyond the obvious, reactionary responses (fight or flight) and mentally upgrade to a mindset that urges you to seek depth (=deeper, more meaningful and integrated solutions).

Wrapping up

Living on autopilot is not just a habit—it’s a silent oppressor that stifles your growth, creativity, and sense of purpose. But here’s the truth: you hold the power to reclaim control.

The tools are within you—metaskills, metacognition, and higher-order thinking. These aren’t just abstract concepts; they’re the keys to unlocking your potential and designing an intentional life that aligns with your values, goals, and aspirations.

So, ask yourself: Will you continue to let mindless routines dictate your decisions? Or will you rise to the challenge, confront your biases, and embrace a mindset rooted in curiosity, reflection, and innovation?

The choice is yours—but the rewards of intentional living are undeniable. Imagine a life where every action is deliberate, every decision purposeful, and every moment infused with meaning.

The time for change is now. Step out of the cage of autopilot thinking and take flight toward cognitive liberation. What’s stopping you?

What’s next?

It’s all about mindset and strategy. As ancient Greek and Roman philosophers taught, we can only control our minds, thoughts, and actions. Focusing on this can help you avoid unnecessary struggle, get unstuck, and move forward faster.

If you need guidance getting unstuck and making crucial mindset shifts, I can help, especially if

• you are a currently struggling introverted solopreneur (stuck in failure, regret and a flawed mindset that doesn’t serve you)

• you want to quit your 9-5 job and create your one-person business, but you struggle to pivot (and then regret not making the leap)

DM me on LinkedIn, and let’s explore how Mindset Coaching can help you move forward and claim what you desire and deserve for a life with purpose, meaning and enjoyment.

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