The Seven Invisible Cages Holding You Back

On distortions, scripts, and the disciplined practice of independence

Sep 10, 2025

Millions watched Dr. Roman Yampolskiy tell Steven Bartlett on this week's The Diary of a CEO that AI could end us. What struck me wasn't his apocalyptic predictions. It was his ability to see the cages the rest of us don't even know we're in.

Watch: Dr. Roman Yampolskiy: “These Are The Only 5 Jobs That Will Remain In 2030!”

Obviously, these are not physical cages with metal bars. I’m talking about the invisible constraints, like social constructs, cognitive distortions, and mental scripts, that shape how we think, what we experience, and ultimately, who we become. They affect your success more than education, grit, or strategy combined. They're the foundation you build your entire life on.

If you haven't encountered Yampolskiy's work, prepare to have your brain turned inside out. Want to stir up a dinner party or at least make an impression? Bring up his timelines, predictions, or thoughts on reality. We're living in a simulation, by the way. Personally, I can't get enough.

Yampolskiy's ability to think about how people think, to notice the invisible barriers we create in our heads, and to lead ourselves and others beyond these barriers, was remarkable to witness.

This interview is a rare “in the wild” example for us to learn from and I highly suggest you watch it (again?) with an eye for the meta-cognition on display. It inspired me to dive deeper into a topic that I have been fascinated with for years, and the next two editions of sparkWILD are the result. I’m excited to hear your thoughts, or at least a good “what really is reality?” dinner party story in the comments.

The Cages We Build Ourselves

I want to start off by stating that we all deal with the effects of these invisible cages. Some of us have more than others, but they are universal. They aren't character flaws or personal failures. In fact, many people believe the purpose of life is to transcend these distortions and understand the world as it truly is.

“The trouble with the world is not that people know too little; it’s that they know so many things that just aren’t so.”
- Mark Twain

What follows isn't a collection of one-time fixes but a toolkit for daily liberation. Each cage has its own signature distortions, its own scripts, its own gravitational pull. Learning to spot them develops a sixth sense for when your thoughts aren't entirely your own.

Before we explore the seven cages, you need to understand their building blocks: cognitive distortions and the scripts they generate. Cognitive distortions are systematic errors in thinking. They're not random. They follow patterns. A distortion like catastrophizing doesn't just make you worry, it writes entire scripts about inevitable doom. Mind reading doesn't just make you guess what others think, it creates elaborate narratives about rejection that feel more real than reality itself.

These distortions don't work alone. They cluster together, reinforcing each other until they form what I call a cage, a self-sustaining system of thoughts that feels like truth but isn't.

In each Cage that follows, I'll identify the specific distortions at work and the scripts they generate. You'll start recognizing not just that you're limited, but exactly how the cage operates. Once you see the mechanism, you can dismantle it. Once you hear the script, you can rewrite it. Once you spot the distortion, you can correct for it.

Remember: these aren't character flaws or personal failures. They're universal human patterns, as predictable as optical illusions. Everyone has them. The difference between those who escape their cages and those who don't isn't about being stronger or smarter. It's about being willing to see the bars.

The Seven Invisible Cages

1) The Algorithmic Cage

This is the cage of outsourced thought. Your next idea wasn't generated by you, it was served before you reached for it. With AI now remembering your conversations and predicting your reasoning, you mistake curation for choice. Those options you think you're selecting? They were filtered, ranked, and arranged before consciousness kicked in. It feels like freedom because you're still clicking.

The distortions are instant and invisible. Availability heuristic makes you believe if it showed up, it must matter. Confirmation bias whispers that trending equals true. Bandwagon effect insists if everyone's talking about it, you need an opinion. You tell yourself you're informed because you skim headlines chosen to enrage, not enlighten. You think you're learning when you're rehearsing loops served by your feed.

YouTube's data shows 70% of watch time is algorithm-driven. People check phones 96 times daily. Over 60% check social media before their first conscious thought. By the time you "wake up," you're already thinking along lines someone else drew.

Keys to Escape:

Ask "Who profits from this thought?" before accepting any idea as your own
Practice "source swapping" - for every familiar voice, add one that makes you uncomfortable
Schedule monthly 48-hour input fasts; document what thoughts surface when the noise stops

2) The Identity Cage

This cage locks you into being instead of becoming. Every "I'm not creative" or "I'm bad with money" becomes a life sentence you serve voluntarily. These declarations feel like self-knowledge but function as self-sabotage. You confuse temporary states with permanent traits. Yesterday's behavior becomes tomorrow's destiny.

The mind plays three cruel tricks here. Labeling turns one overdraft into "I'm financially hopeless." All-or-nothing thinking splits the world: you're either a morning person or you're not, creative or doomed. Fundamental attribution error makes you read your own stumbles as character flaws while giving others the benefit of context. Scripts echo: "That's just how I am," "People like me don't," "I've always been this way." These are cages disguised as personality, and we decorate them with excuses. I'm talking to you introverts who lack social skills!

In Mindset, Carol Dweck proves that once you define yourself in absolute terms, you'll avoid anything that might contradict the label. Students who said "I'm not a math person" scored 15–20% lower than those who said "I'm not a math person yet." Entrepreneurs who said "I'm not good at delegation" grew their companies 50% slower than those who said "I'm learning to delegate." The difference? One word that kept possibilities alive.

Keys to Escape:

Bury “I am.” Replace it with: “I’m being…” That single tweak cracks the door open. We use this with executives and ninth graders.
Keep an Identity Violation Log documenting every time you defy your supposed nature
Rotate identities. Pick a new archetype each month - Leader, Explorer, Artist, Analyst. Try it on like a jacket. Notice you don’t die. Notice you expand.
Tell people three different origin stories about yourself; notice they're all true

3) The Expertise Cage

Success becomes its own trap when what got you here keeps you here. Your hard-won knowledge creates blind spots precisely where you're most confident. The expert thinks in boundaries: "That framework doesn't scale," "Serious professionals use these tools," "That’s not how it’s done." Each qualification becomes a disqualification from seeing differently.

Three distortions lock this cage tight. Mental filtering shows you only what confirms your credentials. Sunk cost fallacy makes you protect past investments over future possibilities. Curse of knowledge prevents you from seeing what beginners see clearly. The scripts are protective but poisonous: "I've built companies, I know what works," "My network expects consistency," "Pivoting now looks weak."

The consultant who built their reputation on one model can't see when it stops working. The serial entrepreneur who keeps building the same company with different names. The investor pattern-matching their way to irrelevance. They declare "This is how value gets created" while holding tomorrow's obsolescence in their hands.

Keys to Escape:

Institute "Dumb Question Mondays" where you ask what everyone assumes is obvious
Regularly do something where you're really horrible, I call it “being the idiot” - pottery, Portuguese, parkour
Partner with someone from an unrelated field on your next project
Teach your expertise to a seven-year-old; whatever you can't explain simply, you don't understand

4) The Comfort Cage

You know you’ve been captured by comfort when it promises convenience but quietly delivers atrophy. Every little shortcut and outsourced system builds weakness. Another way to recognize the comfort cage is when you hear yourself thinking, "Delegate everything non-essential," "You shouldn’t have to struggle anymore," "Focus only on your strengths." The problem is, muscles unused wither, and so does will.

The psychology is predictable. Hedonic adaptation makes yesterday's luxury today's necessity. Present bias trades tomorrow's strength for today's ease. Learned helplessness convinces you that since struggle once felt bad, all struggle must be avoided. You interpret minor friction as poor systems design. Discomfort becomes inefficiency in your mind.

The executive who can't book their own travel. The founder who forgot how their own product works. The strategist who can't execute their own plans. Studies show that people who maintain some operational friction have 29% better problem-solving abilities. Those who stay close to discomfort show 23% better cognitive flexibility.

When Rick Rubin records in places with no cell service, he's not being difficult - he's escaping the convenience that numbs creative necessity. Discomfort is where creativity lives. It's where growth happens. It's where you remember you're alive.

Keys to Escape:

Take stairs when elevators exist, walk when you could drive, cook when you could order
Fast from something different each week - a food, your phone, YouTube.
Make discomfort a love, not a punishment.
Struggle regularly with challenges beyond your ability - if your not failing, your not reaching far enough

5) The Validation Cage

This cage turns your self-worth into a stock price traded by strangers. Every interaction becomes a referendum on your value. The internal voice chatters constantly: "Why didn't they respond?" "Did I talk too much?" "Are they happy with me?" If you think about it, you’re not really looking for feedback. You're seeking permission to exist.

There are three distortions that you usually find creating this cage: Mind reading assumes you know what others are thinking without any evidence, like interpreting silence as something bad - rejection, ridicule, anger - when it really just means they haven’t replied. Personalization makes other people’s behaviors and unrelated situations somehow related to you. Catastrophizing predicts the beginning of the end at every step. The scripts sound reasonable but aren't: "If I was good at this, they would say something," "This isn’t going to go well and I’ll have to be the one to fix it," "They never say thank you to me. I’m not sure what I did."

The dopamine hit from likes, views, and positive reviews triggers the same brain regions as cocaine. Studies involving teens show that when they don’t get enough positive feedback, 43% will delete posts within an hour. Instagram's own research found that 32% of teen girls said the platform made them feel worse about their bodies for this same reason. When you are creating solely for others approval, you will never be enough.

Keys to Escape:

Build in stealth mode for six months - no announcements, no updates, no external validation. Build for you.
Count learning cycles, not wins and get those first twenty “mistakes” out of the way as soon as possible
Create things too unique to trend, too personalized to be appreciated by others, and too weird to share

6) The Narrative Cage

This might be the cruelest because it convinces you that someone else's story is your own. Parents' expectations, society's timeline, your industry's definition of success. "By thirty you should…" "Success means…" "Good people always…" If you think about it, these aren't really your beliefs, but you treat them like natural laws. You're playing buy the rules of a game you never agreed to join, saying things you don’t agree with.

Watch for should statements, which create obligation without examination: "I should be making more money," "I should be working harder." Emotional reasoning says if you feel a certain way, it must be reality, otherwise you wouldn’t be feeling that way. Fortune telling is a slightly less negative form of catastrophizing, but is still knowing what will happen, without any foundation in reality.

Bronnie Ware, a palliative care nurse, found that the number one regret of the dying was "I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me." 87% of people's biggest regrets involved not being true to themselves. That's not a statistic. That's a tragedy.

Keys to Escape:

Write your own eulogy - what do you want said? Now reverse-engineer that life.
List every “should” in your life and business, then trace it back to whose voice it really is.
Design a life that would not be in the wildest dreams of your high school guidance counselor.
What would you do or build if you knew no one was watching?

7) The Time Cage

This cage keeps you attached to the way its always been done, while the world transform beneath your feet. You navigate 2025's AI revolution with 2019's learning methods and growth hacks, and solve today's problems with yesterday's frameworks. The past feels proven, so you stay there. You already learned how to do it, so don’t tell me any different.

There are several distortions at play in this cage, but the top three include: Anchoring , which ties your thinking and mental models to what worked last time. Status quo bias cites the old saying "if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it," while everything becomes obsolete around you. Availability heuristic makes your past wins feel like permanent truths. The scripts sound experienced but aren't: "This is how we've always done customer acquisition," "The fundamentals don't change," "I've seen this cycle before."

In the interview, Yampolskiy operates from the future, not the past. He sees patterns others won't recognize for years. That's not prophecy. That's just being willing to learn, unlearn, and relearn, in order to update your map.

Keys to Escape:

Assume every strategy expires in 6 months (6 weeks if AI is involved); add expiration dates to all your assumptions.
Study companies in industries dying faster than yours - newspapers, taxis, hotels
Have monthly conversations with people 10 years younger about what's already obsolete
Publicly document your pivots monthly - celebrate changed minds, not consistent positions

What makes cages so insidious is that they feel protective. Your brain builds them to save energy, avoid pain, and maintain stability. The Expertise Cage protects you from feeling incompetent. The Comfort Cage protects you from discomfort. The Validation Cage protects you from irrelevance. But protection becomes a problem when the walls you built to keep pain out start keeping possibility out too.

What’s Next: The AI Impact

Spotting these cages is the first step. Most people never get that far. They think their thoughts are who they are. Naming the cages breaks the spell.

But recognition alone doesn’t free you. These patterns are sticky because they’ve kept us alive, but shortcuts that once served us, now keep us small. They don’t disappear just because you notice them. That’s why practice matters. Catching yourself mid-script. Testing the opposite thought. Choosing friction when comfort calls louder.

That’s where we’ll turn next. The cages aren’t new. What is new is the force amplifying them: AI. It doesn’t just exploit the weak points in our thinking, it maps them, scales them, and reinforces them with machine precision. If Part 1 showed you the cages, Part 2 shows what happens when AI amplifies and automates them, and how we at sparkWILD use the same tools to keep us WILD™.

sparkWILD with Chris W Greene

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