The Adoption Of Change
The world of coaching is essentially about change. Some people want to change their income, some want to find peace, many freedom from emotional baggage and others wish to change how others see them. To adopt basically means to take on something of someone else’s and call it your own. Whether it is a concept, a value or a habit. For many people change is imminent, whether it’s forced or chosen it WILL happen. For others the thought of change causes an impulse in their very being to invest an incredible amount of energy into keeping things the same. As odd as it sounds, the same amount of emotional energy generally goes into both.
When we adopt a new mindset, we basically decide that how we think about our world isn’t working for us and investigate new ways of looking at our habits, values and direction. We take on someone else’s map of the world.
Emotional Energy. Emotional energy is the response a person has to a thought, event or concept. whether we like it or not, we cannot not go into our past to engage in the outside world. Our own construct of the world is based on what we know, believe and understand. The moment we do this, we personalize an experience to better understand it in our own mind. Basically we turn that event into our own understanding, thereby changing the truth of the event to the truth of our own inner world. For those of us who want change, we are then one more step away from change rather than closer to it. Change then can only come about when we see it through new eyes, understandings and yes, someone else’s point of view. That is, the adoption of a NEW mindset.
Standing in new shoes. Sometimes when we put on new shoes there can be discomfort. A little blister here, a feeling of not quite right there. Then we put our old shoes on and find that they’ve gotten a bit soft and worn. The same goes for change in our lives. We wish for something different, we may even take steps to make a difference for ourselves and it may feel a little uncomfortable. The greatest challenge we face in change is wanting to put those old shoes on again and feel comfortable, but we bought new ones because the old ones weren’t right anymore.
Crossing the chasm. Change requires putting enough energy, courage and conviction into our future planning that we are prepared to work through discomfort and sometimes “the not knowing” in order to make it stick. We build a bridge between the old and the new and cross. If the chasm we cross isn’t wide enough, the temptation is to cross back again and that’s when we revert to old familiar patterns. Making the gap wide enough to ensure we don’t have enough motivation the cross back is the key. So how do we make it wide?
Toward or away from goal setting. People tend to be one or the other. If you are a toward motivated person then change is going to be easier for you to instigate. You will dangle enough carrots to keep you moving forward to what it is that you desire. Motivation reward and opportunity is always on your horizon. Of course belief and values play a large part in the cycle of change and it is extremely important to define these two things as to their relevance in what it is that you want to change.
Away from people struggle more to implement change . This meta program means that you are motivated by fear of pain rather than hope of gain. If the pain is great enough you will be suitably motivated to move forward with energy and enthusiasm. If the pain isn’t great enough then the motivation isn’t either and wearing old shoes seems more sensible. The greatest reason most “away from people ” fail in the change cycle is that once they have moved far enough away from pain, they get comfortable. If they haven’t installed enough motivation and desire for the change to occur, they slowly slip back into old shoe routine.
Investment in the new. Goal setting, belief challenges and understanding values is the most powerful investment in the new and the greatest driver for change. Boring as it may sound to some, these things should be revisited on a regular basis. Belief drives behavior and all beliefs are unconscious. We often don’t remember when or where we created a belief or whose it was in the first place and trust me, it probably wasn’t yours but someone else’s. Invest your time in new ways of thinking and motivate yourself with gain when you require change and you will be well on your way to your new you.
