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
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