Quick Win: Why your “default behaviour” isn’t actually yours — and how to change it

What if the way you argue with your partner or push yourself at work isn’t actually yours - but something you absorbed decades ago? 

In this Quick Win, I’m joined by educator and author Lael Stone, who explains how the stories we inherit in childhood silently shape our beliefs about relationships, money, and success. Lael calls these “imprints” - and once you start recognising them, you can finally begin to choose your own patterns instead of replaying old ones. 

Lael and I discuss: 

• What “imprints” are and how they form through family dynamics. 

• The surprising ways childhood beliefs can dictate our career choices and relationships. 

• Why understanding our imprints helps us break unconscious habits. 

• How to recognise when fear or loyalty to family stories is keeping us stuck. 

• The freeing realisation that changing your story isn’t disloyal—it’s growth. 

 

KEY QUOTE 

“A lot of the imprints we have are deeply unconscious. We don’t even know they’re there.”  

 

Connect with Lael Stone on Instagram, LinkedIn and her website, and check out her latest book Own Your Story. 

Listen to the full conversation with Lael here. 

 

My latest book The Health Habit is out now. You can order a copy here: https://www.amantha.com/the-health-habit/  

Connect with me on the socials:  

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If you are looking for more tips to improve the way you work and live, I write a weekly newsletter where I share practical and simple to apply tips to improve your life. You can sign up for that at https://amantha-imber.ck.page/subscribe  

Visit https://www.amantha.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.  

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Credits:  

Host: Am

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
What if the way you argue with your partner or
push yourself at work isn't actually yours, but something that
you inherited without even realizing. On today's quick Win, educator
and author Layelle's Stone explains how the stories we absorb
in childhood silently shape our beliefs and behaviors about relationships, money,

(00:26):
and success. By the end of today's quick Win, you
will see how uncovering these invisible imprints can change the
way you show up in every part of your life.
Welcome to How I Work, a show about habits, rituals,

(00:48):
and strategies for optimizing your day. I'm your host, doctor
Amantha Imber.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Now I want to talk about the concept of imprints,
which is a large part of what you write about,
you know, in your story and you know, I guess
like what we've been talking about so far is really
influenced by imprints. So to start with, what is an imprint?

Speaker 3 (01:16):
Well, I explained an imprint, it's like a belief system,
more story that we take on board from our childhood
that we believe to be true. So we have imprints
around everything. From the moment we're born, We're watching our
family of origin and so we begin to make sense
of the world through the lens we look through and
watching them. So I give explanations of like, you know,
if you grew up in a family that loved nature, right,

(01:37):
and it was a really important thing for them to
take care of the environment, that's going to become an
imprint for you. That is kind of an unconscious, you know,
subconscious thing around Oh, we take care of the earth.
We take care of the environment, because that's just what
your parents or your family of origin really valued. It
might be that your family of origin really were into
helping others and maybe they like to, you know, donate

(01:58):
their time or donate good words, and again something that
you may have watched in your family of origin. Really
it's a beautiful thing to give to others, and that
may be something that you've taken on board. We have
imprints around everything from relationships to money, to success, to
how we feel about our bodies, to food to everything. Right,
So we watch all these amazing things, and some of
them are really brilliant, these imprints, and some of them

(02:20):
make you take risks and you know, work hard and
there's a lot of beauty in it. Equally, we have
imprints that don't service right, and so like some of
the classic ones that often see. If you grew up
in a family where emotions we never expressed or never
talked about, everything was pushed under the rug or you
got shamed when you got upset, then you take on
board an imprinterval it's not okay to feel my feelings

(02:41):
and it's definitely not okay to express them. That's a
big one for a lot of people. If you grew up,
you know, watching your parents and the way they communicated
with each other was to yell at each other at
a time, you know, on some level your lens becomes, oh,
that's how you do relationships right. And then you maybe
grow up and you get into a relationship and you
start picking fight and yelling and partner's not yelling back,
and you're like, well, don't you love me, because if

(03:02):
you love me, you'd yell at me, right. This is
what it creates to love for you know, if we
grow up watching our parents be really tender and take
care of each other, that becomes a bit of a
story around this is what relationship should look like. So
we have them on everything, and some service and some don't.
And I think what I have found, and I guess
why I've really focused on this on the book is
a lot of my work has really been around parenting

(03:25):
and around helping parents work with their kids, and so
I would work with thousands of parents and give them
tools about how to get their kids to cooperate and
listening to feelings and all that kind of stuff. But
what I found kept tripping people up is no matter
how many tools I gave them, if their imprint were
so deeply entrenched in the disconnection of feelings in stories
around you know, kids must be good, or this is

(03:46):
about respect or whatever, it was, no matter how many
times we talk about those tools, their default was to
go back to what they had been shown. And so
I began to really say, you know, and this is
very true in many different things, but especially in parenting.
We can turn up and do one thing, but unless
we look at our own story, you know, that often
doesn't hold. And so part of I guess why this

(04:08):
book came about is because working with all these parents,
I began to see that it really was the imprints
that they were modeled when they were younger that was
impacting how they were turning up with their kids. And
then I realized this is not just about parenting. This
is everything. This is how we turn up in the workplace,
this is how we turn up in our relationships, this
is how we do life. And really a lot of
the imprints that we have are deeply unconscious. We don't

(04:30):
even actually know.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
That they're there.

Speaker 3 (04:32):
And then when we do begin to understand or where
they've come from or where they are, often one of
the biggest challenges is we feel that we're being disloyal
to our family if we begin to change them. And
that's a whole other interesting piece that I've found pops up.
If people are like, yeah, I want to be successful,
or I want to earn money, or I want to
start my own business. But if you come from a
family of origin, that's like, you know, no, no, no,

(04:53):
we stick to safe, secure things, you know, and you
only earn this much money, And this is what it is.
We can often feel we're being disloyal to our family
of origin, so we can sabotage ourselves, or even our
family of origin may tell us we're ridiculous. They might
be like, don't try that, you know, don't take a risk.
You do stuff that is safe, right, And so these
are the stories in the belief systems that actually keep

(05:14):
us pretty small and pretty locked down.

Speaker 4 (05:17):
Listening to this excerpt with Layel reminded me just how
many of our daily reactions aren't conscious choices. They're old
imprints playing out. So the next time you find yourself
stuck in a pattern, whether that's snapping in an argument
or shrinking back from taking a risk, pause and ask

(05:39):
is this really mine or something I inherited? And if
you want to go deeper into how family stories and
old patterns shape the way we work, I recommend listening
to my full chat with Layel. You can find a
link to both parts one and two in the show notes.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
If you like today's show, make sure you hit follow
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How I Work was recorded

Speaker 2 (06:05):
On the traditional land of the Warringery people, part of
the Coulan nation.