Part 2 of 3: My Voice Journal Note: The Day I Realised I Was Redundant

I was digging through my old voice journals, looking for a completely different note, when I stumbled across one of my most memorable voice journal notes. It was an experimental dialogue I had recorded, giving voice to the two voices inside my mind: My Conscious (I-Pilot)/(I'm the pilot) and My Unconscious (Autopilot).

For years, I lived under the illusion that having my autopilot direct my life was the default way to live my life. During my trauma healing journey, I realised the terrifying truth: I had paid a terrible prize. I abdicated my throne. I had made myself redundant.

Here is dialogue between the part of me that wanted my throne back, my conscious, and my unconscious, that wanted the status quote to continue. It changed how I view my habits, my trauma, and my future forever.

The Transcript: A Dialogue with My Unconscious

I-Pilot (My Conscious): Good morning, my unconscious. How are you this morning?

Autopilot (My Unconscious): [Startled] Ahh! Is everything okay, I-Pilot? Am I in trouble? Did I let you down? Have I failed in my duty towards you? I can do better, I will do better! Tell me what I need to do that I have not done. I promise I will get it done so you are never bothered again.

I-Pilot (My Conscious): You are not in trouble, and you haven't let me down. I want to talk to you this morning. How are you?

Autopilot (My Unconscious): …I am good… how are you? What do you want to talk to me about? I must have done something wrong. I have always got on with things behind the scenes, making sure everything is exactly as you want it to be. I’ve been doing this for you for decades. You were pleased with me all this time and never once said you wanted to talk. I took that as a sign that I was doing exactly what you wanted. I am in shock. I must have failed you.

I-Pilot (My Conscious): Please, calm down. I am good, and I really just want to speak with you. I realised that you and I have never actually had a talk, and I want to get to know you better.

Autopilot (My Unconscious): I work in the shadow. I am your servant, and I am here to serve you. I pride myself on knowing what you want before you even know it yourself, and getting it for you to satisfy your needs.

I-Pilot (My Conscious): How do you see your role in my life?

Autopilot (My Unconscious): I see myself as the one who helps you leave all stresses behind. I want you to trust me with your life. The promise I made to you is that I will work day and night, every single moment, to serve you. Right now, I manage to put around 95% of your routines, tasks, wants, and actions into autopilot. And I am working hard every day to learn and adapt so I can be even more useful—so you can put 100% of everything on autopilot. That is my dream: for you to trust me with 100% of your decisions. I know I can do it. There was a time when the autopilot was only at 10%. Over time, I managed to increase it to 95% for you. Every time I increased it, I gave you relief from the stress of decision-making, planning your diary, and choosing between competing priorities.

I-Pilot (My Conscious): So you see your purpose as making my life successful and taking all burdens off me.

Autopilot (My Unconscious): Yes. Are you not happy with me?

I-Pilot (My Conscious): I realised that I am not happy with the direction of my life, and the outcomes I'm getting. And I realise it's because I am leaving 95% of my decisions to you. I have become unconscious!

Autopilot (My Unconscious): But I promise you, every decision I make is for your convenience and comfort. I have good intentions for you 100% of the time! I have the ability to make instant decisions based on gut feeling and intuition. Think about it: during your life, there are countless moments where, if it weren’t for me, you would have been in serious danger. I have a survival instinct. I don’t need to deliberate or think; I act in the moment. And you listen to me—whether I tell you to run, or move your hand before it gets trapped in a locking door, or when I tell you someone feels "fishy" and you should not trust them. I am almost always right.

I-Pilot (My Conscious): You are right, my Autopilot. What I’ve realised is that you are my survival instinct, my foundation, and my rock. I trust you with my life, and your quick reactions are the reason I am alive today. I want you to continue being my survival instinct.

But here is an insight I have learned recently: because you were so good at saving my life during my childhood trauma and early years, I passed on more and more of my responsibility to you. I delegated my growth to you. And as my humble servant, you accepted it all and tried your best to carry it.

Back then, I had no experience making leadership decisions, setting a vision, or finding my life purpose. In that vacuum, because those areas required action, I just deferred them to you. I deferred the task of leading my life to you, and in the process, I made myself redundant. My conscious skills became rusty. They began to atrophy.

You took on so much more than you were ever meant to do. And because of our power imbalance, you did not have the confidence to speak up and say to me: “I-Pilot, please sir, I feel the tasks you are delegating to me are outside my area of responsibility. They require leadership skills, creativity, knowledge and wisdom that I do not have. These are actually your responsibilities, and I feel that I will let you down trying to do them.”

I never checked in on you to see how you were holding up under the weight of all these responsibilities. I treated you only as a means to an end. I didn’t provide a safe space for you to raise concerns, or give you after care. I abdicated my responsibility, you took on too much, and I lost myself.

Autopilot (My Unconscious): [Quietly] So... I am not in trouble?

I-Pilot (My Conscious): No. All this time, you were doing everything because I wasn't showing up. I want to step up now and take back my responsibility.

The insight I have gained from psychologist Daniel Kahneman, is that, you as my Autopilot, you area of expertise and responsibility is System 1. You help me make decision fast, automatically and completely effortless—like when I am driving a familiar route or reacting to danger. You help me survive by reacting quickly, not by sitting around pondering abstract concepts. This is your expertise, I cannot and will not take that away from you. I will ensure that I delegate tasks that are only within your competence.

I have learned that my area of responsibility and expertise is System 2. This requires slow, deliberate, logical thinking and takes massive mental effort—like creating a vision and direction for my life. I have been allowing my brain to default to System 1 nearly 95% of the time because forcing the brain to switch to System 2 takes immense energy and feels uncomfortable. It physically drains my body's fuel. My instincts pushed me to rest and delegate these heavy thinking tasks to you, hoping you can automate them.

As Henry Ford put it: “Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it.” I had no business delegating my responsibility to think and grow to you. By doing that, I let both of us down.

Autopilot (My Unconscious): So, you are not unhappy with me?

I-Pilot (My Conscious): I am incredibly grateful for you. You are the expert at System 1. But I was bombarding you with System 2 tasks, which was unfair. You did the best you could, but leading, designing and creating my future is my job. I need to learn, increase my competency, and apply myself.

Together, we can become an unstoppable, well-oiled machine. You will lead our survival mindset and manage all the System 1 processes. And I will lead our thriving mindset, using System 2 to think, set the vision and our direction.

Autopilot: That sounds good. I am really happy that you are pleased with me, and that you're finally back in the driver's seat. I have missed you.

The Beautiful 95% Mirror Symmetry: Dr Kahneman & Dr Eurich Unlocked in Our Minds

I was intrigued and startled when I noticed the mathematical symmetry below that provides a beautiful insight into why we get stuck in life. It took two separate researchers, publishing their work just six years apart, researching aligned but different areas, to arrive at the same conclusion from different angles.

• The Biological Default (2011): Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman published Thinking, Fast and Slow, proving that our brains default to System 1 autopilot thinking roughly 95% of the time.
• The Self-Awareness Illusion (2017): Six years later, organisational psychologist Dr Tasha Eurich published Insight, revealing that 95% of people think they are self-aware, but only 10% to 15% truly are.

This is not a coincidence. These two statistics are mirror images of each other.

Kahneman showed us the mechanism (System 1), and Eurich showed us the result (unconsciousness). The reason 95% of us are mistaken about our self-awareness is because 95% of the time our brains are on autopilot!

We confuse the speed and ease of our Unconscious Autopilot with actual, conscious awareness. Because the autopilot handles our daily routines, social interactions, and immediate reactions so smoothly, we mistake that operational efficiency for deliberate personal leadership.

We think we are the ones driving, but we are actually just like train passengers watching a highly advanced, pre-programmed self-driving train, take us from one train station to another, as we watch our life pass by through the window.

Our autopilot can only keep us safe; it cannot make us fulfil our potential. To break the Autopilot Trap, we have to be willing to adopt System 2 thinking. We have to step back into the driver's seat, look at our overworked unconscious, and say: “Thank you for keeping me alive. I’ll take it from here.”

In tomorrow’s Part 3, I will share practical, actionable steps showing you exactly how I woke up my I-Pilot (My Conscious), learnt to think, and take back my throne and unlock My Path to SelfPower.