Growing Pains
“There is nothing so stable as change.”
- Bob Dylan
As you follow my blogs you will find a recurring theme: If you want to be different you need to start to think different.
In order to think differently, you will need to change what you are doing and how you are doing things to accomplish the changes that you want to make in your life.
This is the hard part. Change. It is scary and very unsettling.
When we change, we have to get away from being comfortable. We need to get off schedule as we make a new schedule. We must change the way we think about and speak to ourselves. We need to change the people we hang out with. We may need to be the “dumbest” person in the room. We will need to step out of our comfort zone and change the way we interact with other people.
If we are loud and brash, we will need to tone it down and become more appropriate with our words. If we are an introvert, we will need to take on a persona that is different for us. We may need to be more aggressive in our interactions. We may need to ask more questions.
All of these changes are hard. They are unsettling. We get nervous and anxious. We have problems sleeping. We question our choices.
Don’t worry this is just your brain trying to get into balance. Your brain likes consistency. It knows what’s going to happen. It is content to stay just where you are … forever. And that is where the problem is.
Change Is Good
When we get into a rut and we can’t move forward we can either “MOVE or DIE”. If we aren’t moving, we are slowly dying professionally, emotionally, spiritually, physically and socially.
Instead of dreading change we should look forward to the opportunity to change our lives.
I liken “change” to starting to lift weights. Early on we get sore and we don’t see much in the way of “results”, but the longer and more consistent we stick to the new way we get less sore and we begin to see the fruits of our labor.
This is the way change is in our life. It’s hard early, but when we stay consistent, we will begin to see our lives change for the better. Things that seemed impossible, occur daily. Rough patches smooth out and we start to see that we can handle anything that is thrown at us.
Change For the Sake of Change
Change is good, but changing for the sake of change is not good. It will cause more harm than it will good.
Too many times people change everything in their life just because they can. I am against this, 100%!
As a strength coach I would make a change in the existing program by introducing a new movement drill and a new upper body strength movement at the beginning of the off season. This way I could see what overall effect it was having on the athletes. If I were to add a new movement drill and a lower body strength movement and we started to have hamstring issues, which new movement was the culprit? By controlling my changes, I could see the direct effect.
Much like in your life don’t change ten things all at once. This will introduce chaos into your life. Add one thing and let it work for a few weeks.
For example, get up an hour earlier so you aren’t in a rush trying to get to work. This early morning change will allow you to be better prepared for the day. You might find that you are more tired at the end of the day. Then you might want to change the time you go to bed. These are easy changes. With a predictable cause and effect.
But if you change the time you get up, along with your eating habits, along with your exercise habits and add on to that changing your workload you might melt down with way too much chaos being added to your life. You are tired, hungry, sore and overwhelmed. Any one of these is enough to make you crawl back into your professional shell and hide … forever.
How Do I Change?
Start small. Baby steps. Conquer one, then the next and then the next. Pretty soon you will be going to sleep earlier, waking up more rested, eating and living healthy and crushing it at work.
But control each of the changes. Think of it as a marathon. Take your time. Gain control of your initial change before adding another change.
Can I change two things? Sure. We wanted to solve the problem of being less rushed in the morning, so we changed our sleep habits. While we are changing our sleep habits, let’s start a walking program after work. When you get home. Put on some comfortable clothes and begin to walk the neighborhood. Or go to a local gym and just use the treadmills.
We’ve now changed two things. They won’t overlap, but they will get us moving towards more changes.
Again, small changes that are built upon each other. This will allow you to control what you can control without feeling overwhelmed.
Times Are a Changin’
Let me reiterate what I said in the beginning, “If you want to be different, then you need to start to think different”. The world is constantly changing. We need to make small changes in our life so we can stay on the cutting edge of our professional world.
What changes can you make that will keep you on top? Because if you stay on top, you will never get behind. Change is good, good change is the difference between the Elite and the average. You choose!
Have an amazing day.
