There is a little poem, "Two men looked through
prison bars. One saw the mud; the other saw
the stars." The moral: You can improve your
ability to deal with change by focusing your
attention on the future and by seeing the glass
as half-full rather than half-empty.
A critical issue in dealing with change is
the subject of control. Most of your stress and
unhappiness comes as a result of feeling out
of control in a particular area of your life. If
you think about the times or places where
you felt the very best about
yourself, you will realize that
you had a high degree of control
in those places. One of the
reasons why you like to get
home after a trip is that, after
you walk through your front
door, you feel completely in
control of your environment.
You know where everything
is. You don't have to answer
to anyone. You can relax completely. You are
back in control.
Psychologists call this the difference
between an "internal locus of control" and an
"external locus of control." Your locus of
control is where you feel the control is located
for a particular part of your life. People
with an external locus of control feel they are
controlled by outside forces, their bills, their
relationships, their childhood experiences, or
their external environment. When a person
has an external locus of control, he or she
feels a high degree of stress. And with an
external locus of control, a person is very
tense and uneasy about change of any kind.
Change represents a threat that may leave the
individual worse off than before.
On the other hand, people with an internal
locus of control possess a high level of selfdetermination.
They feel that they are very
much in charge of their life. They plan their
work and work their plan.
They accept a high level of
responsibility, and they
believe that everything happens
for a reason and that they
are the primary creative force
in their life.
Since the only thing over
which you have complete
control is the content of your
conscious mind, you begin to
deal with change by taking full, complete
control over the things you think. As Aldous
Huxley said, "Experience is not what happens
to you; it is what you do with what happens
to you." Since change is inevitable and
continuous, it is how you think about what is
happening to you that is most important in
determining how change affects you — and
whether you use it to your advantage or let it
work to your disadvantage.
In his book Celebrations of Life,
Rene Dubos wrote that we fear change
more today than ever before, and for
less reason. The reason we fear change
is because we are afraid that we will be
worse off as a result. No one fears
change that implies improvement. For
example, if you learned that you were
going to have to change your lifestyle
because you had just won the lottery,
this is not the kind of change that you
would avoid or anticipate with dread.
It is change that implies unpleasant
surprises that you fear and become
anxious about, because it causes you to
feel that you have lost a certain amount
of control in that part of your life.
Your aim is to become a "change
master," to embrace change, to welcome
change, to ride the tides of
change, and to move toward the
improvements you desire.
Boat builders know that the deeper
the keel of a sailing vessel, the more
stable it will be in storms, squalls, and
gusts of wind. The same holds true for
you. The deeper your keel — or stabilizing
factors in your life — the less
likely it is that you will be blown over
or off course when unexpected change
occurs.
You can deepen your keel and
increase your stability by setting big
goals for yourself and making clear,
written plans for their accomplishment.
Goals enable you to control the
direction of change. With goals,
change becomes planned and deliberate,
instead of random and haphazard.
Goals assure that the changes that take
place in your life are primarily selfdetermined
and self-directed. With
clear, specific goals, the changes that
take place will tend to be positive and
move you toward something that you
want to achieve rather than blow you
off course.
It is inevitable that you will experience
a continuous series of large and
small disappointments and setbacks in
your life. That is the nature of the
game. They are unavoidable. Some
things work out, and some things
don't. Sometimes you win; sometimes
you lose. In spite of your best efforts,
unexpected and unpredictable events
will derail your best-laid plans. This
endless process of change and setbacks
begins when you first enter the
workforce, and it continues for the rest
of your career. Problems and changes
in your work are like the rain — they
just happen. But if you set clear goals
for your work, as well as for your family
life and for your personal development,
then no matter what happens,
you can concentrate your thinking on
your goals and take a long-term view
of your current circumstances. You
can, in effect, rise above the challenges
of the moment and keep your eyes on
the guiding stars of your life and your
most cherished dreams.
With clear goals, you will become
multidimensional rather than onedimensional.
A setback or disappointment
in any one part of your work will
be quickly offset by the fact that you
are busy in other areas, and you simply
won't allow yourself to invest too
much emotional energy in one particular
thing that doesn't work out to
plan.
Now I'd like to share with you a
four-step method of dealing with
change:
The first step is simply to accept the
change as a reality. Acceptance is the
opposite of rejection or resistance.
Acceptance keeps your mind calm and
positive. As William James said, "The
starting point in dealing with any difficulty
is to be willing to have it so."
The minute you accept that a change
has occurred and that you can't cry
over spilled milk, you become more
capable of dealing with the change and
turning it to your advantage.
One of the best ways to deal with
the worry that is often generated by
unexpected change is to sit down and
answer, on paper, the question: "What
exactly am I worrying about?"
In medicine, it is said that accurate
diagnosis is half the cure. When you
sit down and define a worrisome situation
clearly on paper, it suddenly
becomes less stressful to you, and it
will often resolve itself. In any case,
when it is clearly defined, you have
diagnosed it, and you now can do
something about it.
The second step is to ask yourself,
"What is the worst possible thing that
can happen as a result of this change?"
Much worry and stress comes from the
refusal to face what might happen as a
result of a difficult problem. When you
clearly define the worst possible outcome
and write it down next to the
definition of the problem, chances are
you will find that, whatever it is, you
can handle it. Often, your worries will
begin to evaporate after you have
determined the worst that might happen
as a result.
Now decide to accept the worst possible
outcome should it occur.
Mentally resolve that, even if the worst
possible consequence ensues from this
situation, it will not be the end of the
world for you. You will accept it and
carry on. The very act of accepting the
worst possible outcome helps to eliminate
the stress and anxiety associated
with the situation.
The third step in dealing with
change is adjusting your behaviors and
actions to the new situation. Ask yourself,
"What are all the things I can do
to make sure that the worst does not
occur?" Sometimes we call this "damage
control." In the business schools,
this is an important part of decision
making, and it is called the "mini-max
regret solution." What can you do to
minimize the maximum damage that
can occur from an unexpected change or setback? As you begin thinking of
all the things you can do, you are
adjusting your mind to the new information
and preparing to take steps to
deal with the change effectively. Write
these things down next to the result of
step two.
The final part of this four-step
method for dealing with change is to
improve on the existing situation.
Often, a change signals that your plans
are incomplete or that you might be
heading in the wrong direction.
Serious changes, which create real
problems, are often signals that you
are on the wrong track. There is an old
saying, "Crisis is change trying to take
place." You will often find that the
change is a healthy and positive step
toward achieving your goals.
W. Clement Stone, the billionaire
and founder of Combined Insurance
Company, was famous for his attitude
of being an "inverse paranoid." He was
convinced that everything that happened
to him was part of a conspiracy
to help him to be more successful.
Whenever something unexpected
occurred, he immediately said, "That's
good!" and then looked into the situation
to find out exactly what was good
about it.
If you look into any change, you
will always find something good and
beneficial for you. Look for the valuable
lessons contained within every
setback. What is the hidden advantage
that you can turn to your benefit? Is
this change a signal that, if properly
responded to, will save you from a
much bigger change or problem in the
future? Since your mind can hold only
one thought at a time, if you force
yourself to look for the positive aspect
of any change, you'll keep your mind
clear, and you'll keep your attitude
optimistic and confident.
Viktor Frankl said that the last great
freedom of man is the freedom to
choose his attitude under any given set
of circumstances. You cannot control
what happens to you, but you can control
your attitude toward what happens
to you, and in that, you will be
mastering change rather than allowing
it to master you.
A mark of a successful person is
what has been called "tolerance for
ambiguity." This simply means that
you have the capacity to deal effectively
with a rapidly changing situation.
The more successful you become
— the greater your income and
responsibilities, the higher your status
and position — the faster the rate
of change that will be around you. At
every stage, it will be your ability to
function with calmness, clarity, and
quiet assurance that will mark you as
the kind of person who is going
places in life.
In the final analysis, your ability to
perform effectively in a world of ongoing
change is the true measure of how
well developed a person you are. As
you continue to do this, you will experience
a wonderful feeling of self-control
and self-determination that your
whole life will be bright and positive — and so will your results.
The Four-Step Method for Dealing with Change:
- Accept that change is reality. Ask yourself, "What,
specifically, am I worried about because of this change?"
- Determine the worst case. Ask yourself, "What is the
worst possible thing that can happen as a result of this
change?" and decide to accept it if it does happen.
- Minimize the maximum. Ask yourself, "What are all the
things I can do to make sure the worst does not occur?"
- Take action to maximize your current situation — become
an "inverse paranoid." Ask yourself, "How can this
change be a healthy and positive step toward achieving
my greater goals?"
Learn more about Brian Tracy and his bestselling program The
Psychology of Achievement