Personal Change Resistance: It’s getting a bad rap

 

There is an interesting myth that our culture supports; that we resist change. It's interesting but it's also untrue. You may be sitting there thinking "is she out of her mind?" Let me quickly show you my point. You have been making change your whole life. You changed from a child to an adult, you changed schools, moved, and changed friends. The list goes on. As an adult, you have even more change happening to you, some of it you caused and some of it "happened" to you. As you know, change is the only constant in our life, so it washes over us all the time. Change happens.

This leaves us to ponder the questions: If we have so much change happening to us, why do we think we resist it? Why are some changes so hard to make or accept? These are all good questions. Let's examine what change resistance is.

Our tendency is to turn our behavior into a habit. As humans, we benefit greatly from habits. It means we can perform numerous tasks with very little conscious effort. In other words, we don't have to think about things too much. The best illustration of this is when you drive home and suddenly realize you don't remember most of the drive. The drive home is a habit. You don't have to think about how to operate the car or what streets you have to turn on. These habits allow us to more or less go on auto-pilot mentally which reduces the amount of energy we spend on the various tasks of living. If you have ever had a day filled with learning something new, you know just how exhausting that can be. That is how each day of your life would be if you didn't have habits to help you.

An important thing to also understand about a habit is that it takes at least 21 days of repeated behavior to either make or break a habit. Three weeks doesn't sound like much until you try doing it. That means if you want to start exercising regularly, you're looking at about a month before it STARTs to become a habit. If you have ever been to a gym at the first of the year, you would notice a huge influx of people. By February about half of those same people are there. So changing or substituting a behavior means you have to know up front, it will take a while before it becomes routine and therefore easier to do consistently.

A strange aspect to habits is the unconscious aspect to it. That means that we aren't thinking too much about what we're doing, so if it turns out you're a jerk, you probably don't notice it. That's nice for you, not so nice for those around you. That means if you have had a deep and meaningful conversation with your spouse about some crummy behavior, there are worlds of issues creating the "resistance". First, they probably have no idea what the issue is. Second, even if you get them to agree to change, they have to figure out what to substitute. Third, if they figure out a suitable substitute the challenge will be for them to continue to do it long enough to create a new habit or behavior. Real change is possible, but it has its challenges. Let me tell you the refreshing part of this. Most of the people you run into that are jerks (including your boss), don't really realize it. That means, they aren't acting like a jerk to make your life horrible, they are simply doing things unconsciously. The refreshing part of this: it's not about you.

Now that you understand the role habit plays, let's look at how it makes you feel. Because a habit allows you to unconsciously conduct a large part of your life, it allows you to feel comfortable. We are creatures of comfort and we will go to great lengths to maintain that comfort. That means that if we can avoid having to do things consciously, we will. We will only voluntarily make changes when a situation has gotten to a point where we are uncomfortable enough with whatever the issue is, that we then take action. You can logic your way to thinking about a change but if you don't feel uncomfortable enough, you won't make the change. You can look at the no smoking movement. We are putting out all kinds of information about why you shouldn't smoke. Pure logic. The smoking rate continues to grow. If logic worked, none of us would be smoking, overweight or out of shape. Some of us are left to conclude, then, that if we "know" something and don't make a change that we must be resistant. Logic alone won't make most of us uncomfortable.

Change happens to us and is something we do to ourselves all the time for the rest of our lives. We really aren't resistant to it; we tend to avoid paying attention to it. We're dealing with habits, which are hard to change. There is a big difference between being resistant to something and simply breaking a habit. Being resistant is largely an attitude. You can modify your attitude much easier than modifying a habit. Lest I depress you, let me leave you with a few quick thoughts. Breaking a habit or making a change, is a process, so it can be done. You will need to do some planning and set your expectations about the amount of time it might take. Also, we tend to not retain or internalize how to apply one change to others in our life but the minute we do, we become its master.

Discover your passion through your natural creativity

We often find our passions through our creative instincts. We all have them, you know. As children we dance to our own beat, sing our own songs, build our own play worlds, and draw our own designs in the sand. As adults we can recapture those creative instincts by relaxing our minds to new possibilities.

I love to play the "what if I could" game. It allows me the freedom to think without limits. What if I could write a book? What if I could have a million dollars? Maybe if I wrote a book, I'd have a million dollars. What if I could plan a vacation or host a dinner party? What if I could fix a car or fix a computer or raise my own vegetables? What if I could manage a household or manage a group of employees? What if I could help the elderly or tutor children?

Of course, the answer to all of my "what if I coulds" are a resounding "yes". I can do pretty much anything, if I decide it is important enough to me. Whatever I decide to do always takes some level of creativity on my part. To think and to act is by nature using creativity. The more we think and act, the more creative we become. So if you ever think you have no creativity, just recall a time when you thought of something and you did it. We all have. We are all creative. We are humans, the only species given the creative ability to build a wonderful life beyond the drive for food and shelter.

Now get out there, no matter how old, how rich, or how fit you are, and play the "what if I could" game. Dare to show off your creativity. Dare to follow your passion.

Love and Joy, Ruth Colter

 

NOTE FROM DOROTHY: I wanted to let the blog readers know that from time to time, I will be posting articles written by people other than myself but the content reflects what is consistent with Next Chapter New Life direction. Enjoy.

How do I know if I’m ready to retire?

This question isn't really about the financial aspects as much as it's about the emotional or personal side of this equation. It's not the side that gets talked about too much, but retirement is much more than a question of money.

Clearly, you need to ensure you do have a financial plan for the day you decide to take the retirement plunge. Assuming you have some idea of the financial situation in your life, let's look at the other, more personal side.

The quick answer to the question is: Not if you don't have a plan for the personal side of your life. Many people mistakenly think that the day of not working will be a glorious day. What's not to like about not working? Actually, plenty. Up to this point in your life, your work has been the one, if not the primary source, of meaning and purpose. If you unplug from something that vital in your life, you have virtually unplugged yourself from life support. I'm not saying you have to keep working, but I am saying that you can only play so much golf and watch just so much daytime TV before you start feeling totally worthless about yourself.

There is not one aspect of your life that is not impacted or affected by retirement. It's a huge social impact as it will impact your relationships with friends from work and probably your spouse or significant other, family and other non work friends. It impacts how you define yourself and how you find meaning. It means that you need to find something to spark your interest and imagination. You may expand doing some of the things you only got to do periodically when you worked. You will also find new things to do (hopefully). Your financial situation may be such that you need to continue to bring in some income for a while, so what might that work be? Even if the finances aren't an issue, you may decide to work but in a different setting. Many people heading into retirement think about moving to be closer to family or in a geography that better suits them. Then there's the issue of your health and fitness. You might have ignored that while working, but your excuse will be going away. You have to work at staying healthy as you age. Are you getting the drift yet? There are a lot of things to think about. There are things you need to spend time thinking and planning for. This isn't a 2 week vacation. This is probably 30 years (give or take a bit). 30 years of your life is well worth the effort.

If you're sitting there doing a self assessment and you've come to the conclusion that all your ducks are in order both financially and in your personal life, then the answer is: don't wait. This will be the first time in your life that you have the freedom to really choose what kind of life you really want to have. So, don't delay, your life is waiting for you.

 

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Dorothy Tannahill-Moran
Life Coach and Change Agent
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8 CRITICAL SKILLS FOR THE 2ND HALF OF LIFE

Too many people are simply bored with their life. The boredom can create a downward spiral. The spiral can include depression, listlessness, hopelessness and many other negative feelings. Perhaps the biggest issue for a person in this situation is a sense that they don't know what to do and so they do nothing. I call this the "deer in the headlights" effect. When faced with life (as in your life) too many people stop in their tracks, frozen with fear of making that first step.

I'd like to present 8 critical skills that you need to develop now and keep finely tuned. These skills will help you avoid the negative spiral and keep you out of the traffic.

Skill #1: Dream about the future

You don't need to sleep in order to dream. Spend time thinking BIG about your future life. If you have an unfulfilled dream from childhood, re-examine it as a place to start. What exists in your mind but is so exciting it scares you?

Skill #2: Eliminate barriers for your life dream

More than likely, you're your own barrier. What is holding you back? I know of a thirty something that regrets not going to college. She thinks she's too old to do it now. That is the kind of barrier I'm talking about. I have a friend that at 50+ is the "old man" in his political science department. He's getting his Doctorate. No barrier there.

Skill #3: Attain purpose and meaning

Over 40 sometime, we start seeking purpose in new ways. Earlier in life, purpose was creating and establishing elements of life such as: spouse, children, house and career. Now that many of those are in place the purpose shifts. Purpose can be found in giving yourself and surrounding yourself with those things that nurture you. Explore. Find your purpose.

Skills #4 Empowered to choose life direction

Our future is more than the circumstances of our past. There are only 2 things you don't have a choice over: death and taxes. Like the gal previously mentioned, she can choose what comes next. It's your life, take charge of it.

Skill #5: Continuously learn new things

The benefits of learning are numerous. The primary benefit for you will be all the new opportunities that will open up. The possibilities are unlimited. You could learn a new skill, about new places, interests or attitudes. Basically, you will continue to grow. If you aren't growing, you aren't thriving.

Skill #6: Recognize what's possible

Somewhere in our life we start shrinking the possibilities. Remember when you thought you could do pretty much anything? I went to a lecture by Dr. Wayne Dwyer and listened to a young man play improvisational drums. He had no hands. He didn't let that fact shrink him. He looked AND FOUND what was possible.

Skill #7: Learn from mistakes

Failure is a good thing IF you learn something in the process. It's also good because it means you are striving toward something important. Failure can also be an attitude. I've read that Thomas Edison "failed" 10,000 times. He never considered himself a failure. He looked at these results as 10,000 chances to improve his work. If you haven't failed recently, give it a try.

Skill #8: Cultivate meaningful relationships of trust and respect.

We find nourishment from others in our life. We are social creatures that need to give and receive of ourselves to others. Think of this concept like fabric. Fabric has many threads, going in different directions. The sum of the parts is stronger than any one thread.

How developed are these skills for you? It's easier to stay excited about your life than to pull yourself out of the ho-hums. Make this easy on yourself- get these skills and keep them tuned like an expensive sports car.

 

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Midlife Personal Change – coming at you bigger and faster

Yuk! We seem to hate change. We avoid it and at least hope we go through it super fast. I think of this like swallowing cough syrup. If you do it quickly it won't be as bad. I would hope you could think of it as a fact of life and something to build a skill for.

I'd like to adjust your thinking about change especially if you are in your middle years of life. As we know, change is the only constant we have in life. Despite this fact of life, we do little to understand it or to pass on any wisdom about the process. By the time we hit our middle years, the changes we tend to go through start coming at us faster than earlier in our life. They also tend to be more impactful.

Let's look at what is taking place in our middle years. By this point in our life, we have hit most of the major milestones such as going to school, launching a career, getting married, having kids and buying a house. There tends to be an order to how these things take place in our life. At some point, after all these events have taken place, you get hit with a new wave of events like divorce, empty nest, career completion (more on that later), death of loved ones, moving of you or loved ones, retirement, health issues, aging and loss of various bodily functions like your eyesight. This list could be thought of negatively. It doesn't have to be.

Just to make things more complicated in this timeframe we often express our lack of wisdom on change or inability to manage the process of one change, by creating more changes. An example of this is evident at the completion of our career. We start getting restless with our work; need to make a change, so we get divorced. This is the description of misdirected transition management. When we start getting those first internal signals of dissatisfaction, we get dissatisfied with many things all at once. What is prompting the issue becomes blurry. Instead of working through the process, or examining ourselves, we can focus our transition efforts on the wrong thing. We make the wrong change, the issue remains.

I'd like to hit the pause button for a moment on the term "career completion". Careers are taken for granted. We give great consideration and discussion to launching a career. We might have more than one in our life time, but we don't talk too much about the process for when one comes to completion. Our process in not deliberate or well thought out, we just let it happen. We might get laid off and use that to restart a new one or we might stick it out much longer than we should. While I think our professional athletes get paid way too much, I admire the deliberation and forethought that goes into their thought process for completion of their careers. We hear "I want to go out on top". Why don't the rest of us do that? When we don't give career completion any advanced thought, there comes a point for most of us where we do become dissatisfied with what our work is. It happens because we have mastered it and have got out of it about all we can.

The transition around work is not to be underestimated. Work, for most of us, is the thing that gives our life meaning and purpose, even if it is to simply pay the rent. We have an internal need to feel productive. I really think it's almost instinctive. Because of the huge role it plays in our life, we hold on to it in ways that drive and define the rest of our lives whether or not it's a negative role. It may sound like I'm undervaluing the role of our relationships I'm not. I am trying to help you understand that our work can drive us a great deal. When our regard for our work changes, it will impact the rest of our lives.

There are three major things you can do to help yourself manage your transition.

• Simply understand and acknowledge the emotional readjustment that comes with change. It's uncomfortable for a while. Being creatures of comfort, we try to avoid being uncomfortable. Don't avoid it, be with it. This feeling will go away, it will flit in and out of your days until eventually it goes away entirely. The discomfort can also take many forms. You can feel uncertain about your decision, you may question your judgment, you may feel sad, and you may also feel excited. The discomfort has two sides to it. Also, don't rush it. You will go through it now or later, but you will go through it. Best to do it now.
  
• Learn from your transitions and use your wisdom going forward. Ask yourself the good questions: what did I do that worked well the last time? What didn't work and I should avoid? What are some positive, productive actions I can take to smooth this transition? When will I take that action? Process the change, talk to trusted people.
  
• Sit down and think through some actions you can take that will help ease your transition. Taking action will not only help you but it will provide some control over your situation. Make sure the action is useful and related to the change taking place.
  

Change and transition that goes with it can present you with unbelievable opportunities. Change will happen with or without your permission. You have a choice about how you will react to it. You can choose to resist it and make it your enemy. You can make change a companion that is gifting you. Look forward to what it has to offer. Learn from the process, become skillful.

Midlife crisis – Is it real? Am I having one?

Once you hear the term "midlife crisis" it conjures up an image of a pot bellied, middle aged man with a new red sports car and a young blonde babe next to him, with whom he's having an affair. There are other back stories to that image like the fact that he's bored with life and has spent the last six months embarrassing his kids with his attempts at appearing cool and dressing like them. We've all heard about these kinds of things and to some degree, we've seen bits and pieces of it with people that we know. So, it must be real, right?

I personally have a problem (not a big one) with that term. It's cliché and it almost pokes fun at a phenomenon that occurs to all of us to varying degrees. The phenomena I'm talking about is that, at midlife, we make some changes. We've been doing that almost every decade but this one is different. The change is all encompassing as it hits all of our life. It makes us rethink the meaning of our work, the meaning of our life, and the value system we thought we had. We question our relationships, and we start, for the first time in our lives, to seriously think about how we to spend the rest of our life. It's a mid life change for sure. I'm not sure it's has to be a crisis. There are several experts that have studied the various changes we go through and the majorities talk about them in time periods closely aligned to decades. Obviously, as the imperfect creatures that we are, this is very approximate. We all differ.

The 20's is the first real decade of being an adult. We may have been finishing college, but were definitely launching what would turn out to be our first career or profession. That may make it sound like we all did the choosing. In many cases, "work happened" and it turned into a career, such that it is. We were busy discovering what being a "non kid" is like. We discovered numerous things and as a result were often very idealistic during this time. As we neared the end of this decade, our thoughts turned to love.

In our 30's, the reality of life set in. We have fell in love, got married, bought a house, had kids and acquired possessions. In this decade, we hit full speed on everything including our careers. With that we may have developed a keen sense of ambition and were often willing to do what it takes to get ahead.

In our 40's and starting into our 50's life takes a breather. This becomes a catalyst for rethinking our lives. At this point, a number of things that we were so driven to accomplish we have accomplished. The kids are leaving home, the house is almost paid for, you hate your boss or your job, and what you haven't yet bought you don't care to get anymore. The things that were once important to you, no longer are. It doesn't mean they never were important; it's just that they aren't now. It's just that you aren't who you used to be. For the first time in your life, you have actually looked to the future and you can actually see the end in sight. You have now solidly arrived at this midlife rethink, but you really don't know what to think. You can't figure out what is important. With this, my friend, the anxiety builds. This is not a pleasant experience because we are creatures of comfort. We will do almost anything to avoid discomfort. Introspective and creative people will take pause and use this confusing time to really ask themselves the tough questions about what is now important and what will give them new purpose going forward. The less introspective they will try to dump this discomfort like a bad date. What they don't know is that this is an internal process and only they can discover the answers. The answers are not new material possessions, new family, or a big bottle of scotch. This person is developing their own garden variety midlife crisis. It's a crisis. That confusion, the need to figure out what's important, will loom indefinitely until they answer the questions.

The moral to this little ditty is that if you are 39 and counting, you must carry the knowledge that this might happen to you. If you are 40+, you may already be there. Whenever it happens to you, you must relish this time as an opportunity to contemplate what your life ahead will be. Sure, it's hard work to figure out what you want to do when you grow up. It was when you were 18, and things haven't changed. But now, with experience and some maturity, you've got more in your toolkit to answer those questions. You must also acknowledge that this won't be comforting to you until you figure it out, but you will. Once you do pure excitement awaits you. You have to learn and grow. Read. Talk to people. Find your passion. Your passion won't find you.

I can’t retire since: I have no friends outside of work. What will I do when I retire?

Working does bring with it a multitude of benefits aside from a paycheck and health insurance. Our work environment brings with it what I call "automatic friends". These are people that you see almost every day and with whom you have numerous things in common. The biggest is the business you work for. These friends supply numerous things in that setting such as: observations, and someone who looks forward to your arrival. Work friends can become so important to some of us that the environment can become "like a family". It's little wonder that retiring could totally mess up such a good thing.

When you are considering retirement, there are a number of life aspects like friendships, you need to think and plan on. The concern about losing this nurturing support system is a very real issue. It's an even bigger issue if you haven't put very much effort into making friendships outside of the work environment. Even if you have, it is still an aspect that will significantly change once you have given yourself the pink slip.

Many times people considering retirement or leaving a work situation mistakenly think that the friendship will just continue. The mistake is not the intent; it's not understanding the complexities that will ensure the relationship is maintained. Let's examine the various elements that must be considered.

1. We often underestimate or don't even acknowledge the increase in time and effort required. When you work together, you don't have to make time in anyone's schedule – you're both already at work. You may not even "socialize" that much but simply the time spent interacting is conducive to building and expanding your regard for another person.
   
2. We may miss the commonality that work created. There is an adage: We have friends for a reason, a season or a lifetime. Most friends fall into one of those categories. If the reason we formed our friendship was our work environment, what happens to the relationship when the one thing you had in common – isn't? Many times, people will put in an effort to maintain the friendship but over time it withers because the foundation that drew you together is now gone.
   
3. When we work together, the work situation may cause you to not fully "see" the other person's character or personality. In other words, if you are in a funky work situation and you both help reinforce each other negatively, you certainly feel supported. What if the basic content of this person is negative anyway? Once the work situation is subtracted from your interactions, you may discover a fundamental aspect that is not so appealing.
   
4. The other person may simply not be interested in pursuing a friendship outside of work.
   

These considerations are not insurmountable but do require some advanced thought and planning. If you are within a horizon for leaving your work place, now is the time to start changing the context of your work relationships. You can initiate activities outside of the work environment to either replace what you have in common, or minimally, to test how well you relate to each other without work as a backdrop. If you spend time complaining about the boss, make a pact to go an extended period of time not complaining. This will not only make you feel better (because you aren't reinforcing something negative) but it will open up the relationship to better observe each other's real personalities. You could discover you have nothing to talk about. This is much better to understand now than after you leave.

While you are in the midst of reorienting your work friendships, it's advisable to simultaneously work on cultivating friendships outside of work. Again, this will require some thought, time and effort. Friendships are formed because you share interests, hobbies or philosophies. The best way to discover those potential buddies is to become involved in groups that align with your interests. As a working person you may not think that you can afford the time for this kind of diversion. If you are going to supplant your automatic work friends with new ones you will be better off starting the process before you leave.

There are numerous other actions you can think of to leverage the work friends you've made as well as making new friendships outside of the work environment. You may have a very real concern about the impact on your work friendships. The point to this is that you will be far better off thinking through this issue and working on it than just letting it happen or avoiding taking the next step.