The Science Behind Self-Learning

How We Learn To Understand Ourselves And Change What We Do

The science behind self-learning begins with understanding how experience, expectations, behavior, and practice interact. Self-learning is more than acquiring information. It means becoming an active participant in how you think, respond, practice, and change. The Mulry Method organizes this approach around a simple principle: We become what we do.

Understanding a problem can be valuable, but understanding alone does not necessarily change behavior. Change develops through experience, practice, observation, and learning what happens when we respond differently. The Mulry Method brings these elements together through Social Learning Theory, Internal Locus of Control, Relaxation Therapy, self-assessment, and practical skills training. Rather than telling you what you should become, the goal is to help you learn more about yourself and develop the skills to take purposeful action.

Social Learning Theory: The Foundation Of Self-Learning

A major theoretical foundation of the Mulry Method comes from Julian Rotter’s Social Learning Theory. Rotter proposed that behavior cannot be understood simply by looking at a person or the environment separately. We learn through our continuing interaction with situations, experiences, expectations, and the consequences of our behavior.

Four concepts are especially important:

• Behavior Potential (BP): The likelihood that a particular behavior will occur in a particular situation.
• Expectancy (E): What you expect will happen as a result of a particular behavior.
• Reinforcement Value (RV): How much you value a particular outcome or reinforcement.
• Psychological Situation (PS): How you perceive and interpret the situation you are in.

Rotter expressed this relationship as BP = f(E & RV) in PS. In other words, what we are likely to do depends partly on what we expect to happen, how much we value the possible outcome, and how we perceive the situation.

This gives self-learning an important foundation. Instead of asking only, What is wrong?, we can begin asking more useful questions: What am I doing? What do I expect to happen? What matters to me? How am I interpreting this situation? What could I learn to do differently?

Expectancy Changes Through Experience

Expectancy is particularly important because our expectations develop from experience. Repeated attempts that end in failure may lead you to expect failure again. Avoidance can also become learned when it repeatedly reduces discomfort. On the other hand, successful practice can create new experiences that gradually change what you expect to happen.

This is one reason practice matters so much in the Mulry Method. Learning a skill provides an opportunity for a different experience, and a different experience can influence what you expect the next time you encounter a similar situation. Self-learning therefore becomes an ongoing process of observing, learning, practicing, experiencing, evaluating, and adjusting. You are not simply studying yourself. You are participating in the learning process.

Internal Locus Of Control: Focusing On What You Can Influence

Rotter’s work also introduced the concept of locus of control. An Internal Locus of Control does not mean believing you control everything that happens. Many circumstances remain outside our control. The important distinction is recognizing where your own actions can make a difference.

You can learn new skills, practice, change how you prepare, evaluate your behavior, and choose another response when circumstances allow it. This shifts attention away from trying to control every outcome and toward developing greater command of your own actions. That is central to self-learning.

The Nervous System And The Learning Situation

Thinking and behavior do not occur separately from the body. When we perceive threat, our breathing, muscle tension, attention, heart rate, and readiness for action can change. These responses may influence how we interpret a situation and what behaviors seem available to us.

Polyvagal Theory offers one framework for considering how the autonomic nervous system responds to cues associated with safety and threat. This creates an interesting connection with Rotter’s Psychological Situation. Two people can encounter similar circumstances yet experience them very differently. Even the same person can perceive a situation differently depending on previous learning, expectations, physical state, and context. Becoming more aware of these mind-body responses creates another opportunity for self-learning.

Relaxation Therapy: Learning A Different Response

Dr. Ray Mulry began developing Relaxation Therapy in the early 1970s as a practical method for learning greater awareness and control of mind-body responses. Relaxation in this context does not simply mean resting or trying to feel calm. It is a skill.

Through repeated practice, you learn to recognize tension, regulate breathing, reduce unnecessary muscular effort, focus attention, and become more aware of your responses. This matters because the state in which you approach a situation can influence what you perceive and what you do next. The goal is not to eliminate every uncomfortable response. It is to develop greater flexibility so that tension, fear, frustration, or habit does not automatically determine your behavior.

In The Zone Skills Training: Turning Learning Into Action

Awareness becomes more useful when you can translate it into action. In The Zone Skills Training provides 40 structured lessons for developing practical mind-body performance skills. The training works with breathing, posture, balance, movement, attention, energy, and focused action. These are not isolated techniques. They provide opportunities to practice responding more deliberately to changing situations.

This is where self-learning becomes experiential. You practice a skill, observe what happens, notice what works and what does not, make adjustments, and practice again. Over time, skills that once required deliberate attention can become increasingly available when you need them.

The PCI: Learning What Matters To You

Self-learning also requires knowing where to direct your attention. The Personal Concerns Inventory (PCI) helps identify and prioritize concerns that are personally meaningful to you. Rather than beginning with someone else’s assumptions about what you should work on, the PCI helps you examine your own concerns and identify what Dr. Mulry called Highly Focused Concerns.

Once a concern becomes clearer, you can examine the expectations, behaviors, skills, and circumstances associated with it. You can then focus your learning and action where they are most relevant to your life. Repeating the PCI over time also provides an opportunity to observe how your concerns and priorities change.

Becoming Your Own Self-Learner

The different parts of the Mulry Method work together as a learning system. The PCI helps clarify what concerns you. Social Learning Theory provides a framework for understanding behavior in context. Relaxation Therapy develops greater awareness and regulation of mind-body responses. In The Zone Skills Training gives you practical skills to practice and apply, while Internal Locus of Control keeps attention focused on the actions you can influence.

As you put these skills into practice, experience provides new information. You can observe the results, learn from them, make adjustments, and decide what to do next. This is why self-learning is not a quick fix or a collection of information to read once. It is an active process that develops through repeated observation, practice, experience, and adjustment.

We become what we do.

Ready to begin? The Personal Concerns Inventory (PCI) can help you identify the concerns that matter most and provide a starting point for focused self-learning.