Tic Mythology 8 - Correcting Tics

One of the most important and peculiar things about tics is the apparent paradox of: the more you try to stop it, the stronger it can become. There is a reason for this and it appears to be tied to how our minds work to help us get by day to day. Well-meaning parents and teachers often run into this paradox when trying to help children with tics.
Some people have described tics as being like a small child that keeps doing an aggravating behavior - the more you pay attention to it, the more it does it. I have found it helpful to try to diagram it in a rather simple (though not necessarily easily-understood) way:
Urge -- Tic -- Correction
Our brains are very good at identifying patterns and predicting the near-future (not so good at appreciating the long-term future ). Therefore, they quickly recognize that when the Urge shows up, the Correction may soon be coming and they don't like Corrections. So the brain reasons "I don't want that Correction, but if the Urge showing up means the Correction will be coming, I've REALLY got to get rid of that Urge!" and the brain already knows "The Tic will get rid of the Urge!"