Small Change. It Adds up to a Lot

When I think about it, I must be something of a change junkie. Looking back over the past 20 years, I've moved country (and continent) five times, moved house more than a dozen times and changed career three.

Each of those moves was a significant life change, involving a big blind leap of faith on my part, grabbing an opportunity and believing all the pieces (small things like oh, where to live and which hospital I might have my baby in) would fall into place. Which they did. Luckily, some might add.

July 4th, 1992, for example, saw me sleeping on a friend's couch having lost a relationship, job and home all in the space of a weekend. It also saw me swimming under the stars at my friend's condominium and feeling freer than I ever had in my life. In the words of Charles Dickens,  it was the best and the worst of times. It was also one of the biggest opportunities I have been given - a chance to start from scratch.

The road I thought I was going along quite happily, quite simply disappeared under my feet. It was time to find, or create, a new one. Anything was possible and it was all up to me and what my next decision would be. What I did next took me from San Francisco to Hong Kong and a new career in publishing and media. Out of some of those darkest moments came a dazzling new opportunity. Time to shed off the old and embrace a whole new "New".

Now, I'm not advocating big life-changing decisions right here and now for everyone. But what I love about those big changes is how everything gets thrown up in the air and the cards are allowed to land where they may. They throw up new connections, friendships, hobbies, new sights, sounds, smells. Change that dramatically alters the environment we live and sense in, teaches us ultimately, that what we own and what we have around us pales into insignificance in comparison to who and what we are. And what we're made of.

Big change makes you feel alive. It  can also, by the way, almost kill you with stress.

Change junkie that I am, even I recognise that for most of us, the best, most satisfying, longest-lasting (and least traumatic) kind of change is that which occurs a little bit at a time. One eentsy weentsy baby step and then another, then another.

Change doesn't have to play out like a big Hollywood epic. Small changes are those which, on the surface, don't appear to be much, and perhaps no one else notices, but can lead to some of the most transformational shifts in our own behaviour.

Small shifts - deciding to be on time this time, taking one sugar not two in your coffee, choosing to smile more - they're not hard to achieve. They just take a level of deciding and committing.

Imagine we're trains (go with me). You may have noticed this - but trains don't do right angles. They simply can't. Their mass and speed and length makes the whole notion absurd. If a train needs to change direction it does so one millimeter at a time.  Very gradually the tracks curve left or right, no sharp movements, no massive change in direction. But before you know it, you've arrived at Brighton rather than Waterloo.

That's not to say 90 or 180 degree changes are wrong. Just not always necessary. Why make a dramatic change when a small one will do?

Sometimes, when we're fed up with our lives, we're tempted to make those big sweeping changes just for the sake of change. But sometimes it only takes a small thing to make all the difference. You may not need to find a new job, but rather change small elements of the one you have. You may think you need to lose 10 pounds, when in reality losing just two makes you feel and look better.

When it comes to making changes, the following is true:

• Change does happen overnight. It's the process of getting to the change that takes time.
• The toughest place to be is Making a Decision
• Smart change means resisting the temptation to throw everything away. It means recognising and keeping what's good, and addressing the not-so-good.  
• The unknown is a doorway not a cliff. Change may be terrifying but it is also liberating.

For more, read 10 Ways to Change Your Life in an Instant

In the meantime, I'll be talking about those small changes and how they can dramatically improve your life tonight on Let's Get Real Radio with Cathy Matarazzo, (7pm to 8pm UK time). Listen in here: http://www.letsgetrealradio.ca/

Best wishes

Dawn

10 Ways to Change Your Life in an Instant

Contrary to what some might say, change does and can happen overnight. It happens quickly when we experience a deep and profound shift in the way we think. We get to the line we need to cross, step over it and realise we are never going to take the step back again.

While this shift can happen in an instant, it is often as a result of weeks, months, even years of agonising and deliberating over. The most difficult place to be is stuck in the process of making a decision.

With that in mind, here's a set of life-hacking techniques to bring change into your life without the fuss. 

1. Change your perception
How we perceive our current situation is our reality. Changing our perception changes our reality. Sounds a bit heavy I know - but what this means is, you can change your life simply by looking at it in a different way.  People experience this most dramatically  when they have a chance to see their own life in contrast to someone better or worse off. Your problems don't seem like problems compared to a prisoner's or someone with only months to live, for example.
Action  Ask yourself: How can I look at this situation differently/more positively/from a different angle? List the ways your perception of the situation might be hindering rather than helping you.

2. Tackle Your Tolerations
Tolerations are all those annoying things we're putting up with: the dripping tap, the pile of filing that's been sitting on the desk for months. The cumulative effect is that they zap energy and leave you feeling irritable and overwhelmed. Hardly a great frame of mind to be in if you want to create change in your life.
Action  Grab a piece of paper and a pen. Write down everything (and everyone) that is bothering you. Don't edit yourself. Carry on writing until you can't think of anything else. Your goal is now to tackle one thing on that list per week. Get the tap fixed. Do your filing. Cross each item off as you do it. Your goal is to get to ZERO tolerations. How long it takes is up to you.

3. Change what you really think of yourself
How often does the internal critic pop up in your head listing all the ways you don't measure up? We believe everything we tell ourselves  - unfortunately it's human nature to focus on our negatives rather than our positives. But how true are our own self-criticisms?
Action   Day One- Spend a day taking note of all the times you say (out loud or internally) something negative about yourself. How often do you say things like - I'm so fat, I'm useless at numbers, etc etc? Write these down. Take each one and challenge it. Are you really all those things you say about yourself?  Day Two and onwards - every time you catch yourself saying something negative, stop. Swap it for something positive. The goal is to eliminate all negative limiting beliefs from your thoughts.

4. Try something you've never done before
There's nothing like trying something new and different to alter your perspective and get you out of a rut.
Action   Make a list of everything you really want to do or try in your life. Choose one thing. Do it. Move on to the next thing. Ask yourself - what is stopping me from doing this? What would it take for me to do this?

5. Find out where A is
To get anywhere different you need to have a clear picture of where you're starting from.
Action   Take stock. Do a Life Audit. Assess your relationships, physical health, finances, work and career. Where are you really? What are you in denial about/not facing up to. This is point A - your starting point.

6. Decide where you want B to be
Action   Imagine your own idea of a perfect life. Where do you live, what do you do? How often do you go out, what do you like to do in your spare time? Write it down. No need to edit, it's not an exercise in what's realistic. It's pure escapism (for the time being). What would it take you to get from where you are now (point A as defined in 5) to where you want to go  - Point B? Be your own Sat Nav.

7. Perform a random act of kindness
It sounds a little twee maybe but it works. My own coach selects a random name from the phone directory every Christmas and sends that person £20 along with a note asking them to accept the gift and enjoy it however they see fit. That might not be to everyone's taste. But psychological research shows giving makes us feel happy and more fulfilled.
Action   Find your own way to perform a random act of kindness.

8. Change your routine
We get into a pattern where we accept the routines we've created for ourselves. Don't settle. If you need a quick boost or feel in need of instant change, make a few alterations to your day. 
Action  Change the time you get up, exercise, what you have for breakfast,  your route to work and your means of getting there, what you do for lunch, what you do when you get home and so on. You don't have to change everything. Pick one or two things if that's what feels right. Small changes to your routine can be enough to kick-start you out of the rut.

9. Stop should-ing yourself
Ever caught yourself saying "I should be doing x" or "I really need to do y"? The word should rings alarms bells to coaches as it indicates that a client is doing something that goes against what they really want to do. It does not come from an internal desire or motivation. Someone who says "I really should lose weight" hasn't yet got to the place where they want to lose weight, so any chance of actually sticking to a diet and exercise programme is highly unlikely.
Action   List all the times you say should. Catch yourself when you say it. Challenge why you are using the word "should". Do you really want to lose weight, take a job offer, follow a certain career path - or are these someone else's expectations of you. Ask yourself: who am I doing this for? Practise saying no to things you feel you "should do" and focusing on things you are motivated to do. 

10. Just say Yes
Do you automatically say no to something - a request, an invitation - without thinking it through? We can get into a pattern of saying no, when if we really thought about it, there's no reason not to say Yes. I'm thinking of my own children and how often they'll come to me to ask me something - along the lines of "Can you read me a story?" or "Can you play with me? And, being busy in the middle of making dinner or sending an email,  I usually brush it off with a "Not now, later".  What I find, in reality is just 5 minutes of my attention makes all the difference.
Action   What are you saying No to when there's no reason not to say Yes?


Good luck with all your changes - big and small!

Best wishes,

Dawn

I felt so bad I...

When it comes to physical and emotional pain, we're quite clear on whether something hurts or not, and of course where it hurts. What we're not so clear on describing is how something hurts, or how much.

In other words, when we're trying to tell someone how bad we really feel, do they actually get it? Do they understand completely, this huge abstract and intangible thing we feel as pain? They can't see it, or touch it. Is their understanding of our pain limited by the language we use to express it?

According to Dr David Biro, author of The Language of Pain - Finding Words, Compassion and Relief, the answer is usually yes. Describing pain in more detail and more specifically to your doctor, for example, he says can make all the difference to your treatment, and can in some cases save your life.

"A good description of pain can be as important as a physical exam or an MRI scan in making the right diagnosis of an illness", (The Importance of Describing Pain to your GP, Dr David Biro, The Times, 31st August 2010).

"Saying your pain is a seven out of ten doesn’t convey very much," he says. "Rather, tell the doctor how pain affects your life — it’s so bad that it wakes me up at night - and what makes it better or worse - it helps to prop my leg on a pillow. A good story always registers more effectively than an abstract number."

"A good story always registers more effectively than an abstract number"

So what about our emotional pain? Does the same rule apply when trying to convey how another's words or actions might have hurt us, for example?

With that in mind, I adapted Dr David's methodology to my own coaching sessions, in particular with the idea of helping my clients create a breakthrough in communication whether in their personal or professional lives. In the case of William*, a rugby-playing, hard-edged Alpha Male, the results were so profound, they've changed his negotiating style for the better.

William was furious with his solicitors who had, he believed, acted completely negligently in the purchase of his new house, to the extent that the sale almost didn't go through. To William, this wasn't just any house, it was his dream home, a beautiful house in a rural setting he'd first set eyes on some eight months' earlier. After months of negotiating, the house was almost his, until his solicitor got involved and started causing problems.

"It was clear he was too busy to read through the information he was being sent through by the vendor's solicitors. He wasn't passing on questions I had about the house, I had to rewrite letters he was sending to the other side, and on the day we were about to exchange, he went on holiday. The first I knew about it was the "out of office" notice I received when I sent him an email".

Says William, "I completely lost it at that point. I got angrier than I have ever been in my life. I could feel my blood pressure rising and I felt absolutely sick with stress and dread".

William came to me wanting some coaching ahead of a phone call he wanted to make to his solicitor to go over the handling of the conveyancing and also to negotiate the fees down.

As we discussed how he wanted the negotiations to go, I was aware that William was using very vague and emotionless words to describe his feelings. He said things like, "The service was completely unacceptable" and, "The handling of this was incredibly unprofessional". The words may sound very adult and sensible but they did little to convey the desperation William had actually been feeling at the time. The words were a barrier rather than a conduit.

I suggested instead that he be absolutely truthful and give a very colourful description of how his solicitor's actions had made him feel including the consequences of those feelings, along the lines of "Your handling of this case was so shockingly poor I became so stressed to the point that I was physically ill".

William thought about it for a moment. Talking about feelings wasn't usually part of his professional everyday vocabulary. But after a while I could see he was getting quite enthusiastic about the idea.  He said he would give it a go.

I didn't have to wait long to find out how it went. A day later, William bounded up to me with a twinkle in his eye. "You know that advice you gave me, about describing to my solicitor how ill I had felt over his handling of the house sale?  Well it absolutely worked. Thank you."

According to William, the conversation had started very stilted, with both sides acting defensively to the point where no progress was being made.  "But when I said how ill the whole situation had made me, the conversation changed. We started talking on the same level. I think by being so open and honest, it brought down some barriers.  Everything changed from that point on".

William was able to negotiate the fees down, the lawyer apologised, the conversation ended on a mutually agreeable note.

Being specific about how things affect us - not just "this upset me" or "I was bothered by"... but saying "I was so annoyed I went home in a mood, and had an argument with my husband and my whole evening was ruined" or "She provoked me so much I literally broke down sobbing" - can be incredibly transformative. It may sound weak to describe your feelings in this way, but by doing so you paint a picture of colour and depth to the other person in a way they can't help identify and, hopefully, empathise with.

 

In other words:

1. Be specific - say exactly what's bothering you and why.

2. Be descriptive - describe how something has affected you on a personal level.
3. Describe the consequences of how something has made you feel: "I was so upset by your comment I didn't sleep all night", for example, rather than "I was really upset".

Best wishes,

Dawn

Dr David Biro teaches at SUNY Downstate, an academic medical centre in New York. The Language of Pain: Finding Words, Compassion, and Relief by David Biro is published by W. W.Norton, 18.99

http://www.davidbiro.com/