I want to start by thanking everyone who sent private messages after yesterday’s WHAT IF post and to those who are joining me on this 40-day journey. Giddy Up! And yes… for those asking about the big announcement, you’ll still have to wait a little longer. LOL.
Last night my what-if machine was firing on all cylinders. When I finally asked myself why, it pointed me toward the next step in this cognitive detox and reset. Like red tomato sauce on a white shirt five minutes before a meeting, there it was, obvious, loud, and impossible to ignore, MY DEFAULT MECHANISM.
Our Default mechanism is the operating system you didn’t choose, but you’re still running in the background. It is the automatic setting that runs your thinking when you’re not consciously experiencing yourself thinking. Most of our defaults were installed years ago, we just keep renewing the subscription without ever asking if we still need it.
We have many defaults mechanisms that impact our human experience, and the most impactful one is called our default future. The future you expect, not because it’s true, but because it’s familiar and shaped by what you think will happen, fear will repeat, hope will improve and most of all the language we use during self-talk.
The default future we believe in is predictable and it doesn’t ask anything new of us or challenge comfort, or require risk.
All of us will carry everything or somethings that did not work in 2025 directly into 2026. We will use it as backups. Recycling old limitations, doubts, coping mechanisms, wrapped in a new calendar year.
You and I cannot create a new future when the old one is already coming at us taking advantage of our own algorithms. The good news is we have something that can move us out of this space. Language. We use language in two primary ways: to describe and to create. The Default future lives in descriptive language from the past. A new future uses created language.
I am saying a BIG NOT to another year of operating on repeat with anything that does not serve my greater purpose.
So on Day 2, I will clear the mental, linguistic, and emotional debris that has been scripting a future I am unwilling to live. Period!
This is what I did.
Step 1: Identify My Default Future
I asked myself these questions and wrote my responses honestly:
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- What future have I already predicted for myself without noticing?
- Is that the future I actually want?
- What from 2025 is quietly shaping how I see 2026?
- What default thinking do I need to empty out so I can create something new?
Step 2: Interrupt It and Create a New Future
I wrote down what I am no longer willing to bring into 2026.
Then declared in created language the future I am wanting instead.
One sentence to interrupt the default, One sentence to create the new future. Simple and done. Keep it simple as they make Great affirmations.
Join me and Simone Vitellaro in IGNITE Readiness Workshop on January 10, 2026.
