DRAFT
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“Dear World: You are my only test environment. As I change, I’m bound to leave a few messy experiments in my wake. I give myself permission to experiment with change every day.”
As you work to implement change in your life, you will encounter many invisible barriers. Backing away will leave you stuck in old mindsets and patterns. This is where the rubber meets the road; going forward is the only option.
Implementing change in your life or your plans is bound to disappoint others. Embracing that disappointment, and the feelings it triggers is a critical catalyst for growth. A person with a healthy ego and strong sense of self would never consider dousing his or her goals in the face of others’ disapproval. Why would you? Why is it so hard?
Implementing change forces many uncomfortable truths to the surface. Here are some examples that came to bear for me as I began to insert my goals more forcibly into my life.
- I tend to be flexible and accommodating of others, with the assumption that they would certainly do the same for me. In one case, a family member required me to change my plans often. I traditionally accommodated last-minute schedule changes that in effect, completely hijacked my own plans for a day, or a week or more. I assumed this would be reciprocated were I to assert myself. However, when I began insisting my goals would need to begin to be given equal consideration, instead of being met with compromise or considerate pre-planning discussions, I was given absolute win-lose ultimatums thats suggested my self-promotion would be the cause of the entire family’s loss. This took me years to work through and finally, with the support of outside experts, see how truly aggressive and controlling it was. I had never truly seen how controlled I allowed myself to be because I was always the first to back down, drop plans or accommodate the other. I quickly learned that I should have pushed harder far earlier in order to see the truth.
- A lighter and happier example was when I began to demand I see shared compromise whenever I needed to accommodate others. I had been giving up key productivity hours to partner with a friend on a volunteer project. I realized that compromise was being made so that she could attend her favorite fitness class. I quickly saw the one-sided arrangement I’d fallen into. When I talked with her to reschedule our regular meeting time to a timeslot that worked better for both of us, she happily accommodated.
When we begin to re-insert big goals into a busy life, we need to prepare for many types of disappointment. Having honest, albeit tough, conversations with others is a fantastic and constructive exercise. It grows your skills for communicating your own goals without apology. Any discomfort you experience is a sign that you are pushing to your edge and re-growing your healthy ego.
You get to observe all the people in your life and how they support your unique goals. You get to practice not rescuing their emotions but rather staying within your own skin.
ACTION TODAY:
Complete this activity to help you prepare for and schedule a few tough conversations.
“Dear World: You are my only test environment. As I change, I’m bound to leave a few messy experiments in my wake. I give myself permission to experiment with change every day.”
