I’m always a little surprised when I’m asked, “Can people really change?” Yes, people can really change. And if you’ll excuse the double negative, I’d say people can’t not change.

While I’m not an expert on too many things, my humble observation is that everything changes. All the time. I don’t know about you, but I wake up older everyday. I know about homeostasis but I think it’s to keep us on some even keel as we experience change around us at every moment.

Change happens, whether you believe you are in charge of it or not. If you don’t believe you are driving your own life, then change happens, you just didn’t give it much intention or direction. That’s a waste, because I really think we know what’s best for our own lives.

So it bums me out when people believe that they can’t change. I believe that a lot of distress in the world comes from a fundamental belief that we are primarily victims with little to no ownership of our lives. Here are some problems that I think come from, at least in part, this worldview: hopelessness, feeling stuck, over-focusing on aspects of life that are beyond our control (death, what others choose to do, what might happen in the future), getting overwhelmed by these uncontrollable aspects of life, feeling insignificant, numbing out, and blaming and raging at others.

On the other hand, people who bring intention and awareness to how they want to live feel happier and cope better with what’s out of their control. When we realize what we can control, and make our decisions accordingly, then life feels a whole lot different. We absolutely have a lot of control over our words, our thoughts, our behaviors, our reactions, our emotions, our choices, our preferences, and our priorities. Using our time and resources to learn how to be a skilled operator of these aspects of our being is a worthy investment.

People who are empowered to change, who own their choices, are a happier lot. They don’t look for others to provide the answer, they consult with others in a quest for their own truth. They don’t wait for circumstances to be different, they look for a path to where they want to go no matter what the terrain. They don’t make excuses, they make opportunities.

Our lives will be different in 2013 than in 2012. The question is: Do you want to shape the direction of your life or not?

I hope so. I know it can be daunting, so I hope you’ll check back here for some support and encouragement. You can do this life thing, I know it.

I get excited when clients make breakthroughs. They are also really excited, and so we both feel terrific. This week, a client pointed out that not every session contains a breakthrough. “That’s true,” I admitted. It got me thinking about the importance of having a breakthrough- a sudden “click” or an “ah-ha” moment. Should I be trying to get people to have one at every session?

As motivating and energizing as a sudden advancement in knowledge or awareness can be, a breakthrough is just one aspect of therapy. That is the answer that came to me in the place where I have most of my breakthroughs: the gym. Having come off yet another small winter illness, it felt like a feat just to show up. That was my breakthrough. Just showing up is the real work of any long-term commitment whether it be marriage, parenthood, self-improvement, pursuits in fitness, or therapy. Consistent attention, awareness, and action on the things that matter is what really drives the change process.

Of course we want the quick-fix, the get rich quick, the headline news, the Cliff Notes, and the made for TV version of reality. That’s why we want to go to therapy and just have breakthrough after breakthrough. But breakthroughs are nothing without follow-through. It might not be as glamorous, but hard work still matters. The effort of paying attention so that we can break old habits to create new possibilities is worthwhile.

Change. That’s what’s on my mind. This week I have been really inspired by stories of change all around me. People always presume that my job is kind of a drag. They think that all I hear about is stuff that would ordinarily bum anybody out. Honestly, it’s truly the opposite on most days. What’s really going on all day is people showing up in my office with a lot of will to have things go better in their lives. There are certainly ups and downs and rough situations that people have encountered. However, the majority of people stick with coming to see me and they succeed with their goals. That’s incredibly uplifting. My job is pretty awesome.

In a recent post, I talked about how people have to decide to make changes. Then, with intention and attention, changes can be made. But how do people decide to make a change? What does that take exactly? What I’m thinking is that people need to be aware that there is a potential and opportunity for change. They need to see it as an option.

That’s where my job comes in. I help direct people to think about their options and the potential actions they can take. It seems simplistic when I write it like that, but it can be a profound process. I think about how I decided to start a private practice. A colleague and friend said that she thought that I was someone who could very well start a private practice. She brought that possibility to my awareness. I decided to do it and (luckily) she was right! So here I am.

It looks like identifying the possibilities available to you at any given time and being open to choosing something different might be a key catalyst to starting a change process. You can set yourself up for change by trying to cultivate a habit of thinking about all the options before you rule any out. You can also surround yourself with creative, inspiring people who can help you identify possibilities that remain hidden from your view.

I’m going to try to be more open to suggestions and to new ways of doing things. Those seem like sensible measures to take against ruts and monotony that tend to put a lid on healthy change. What supports your healthy change process?

I’ve been inspired lately by someone who works tirelessly to grow and change. She wakes in the wee hours of the morning practicing new skills for hours at a time. Everyday there are profound differences from the day before. It sounds quite tiring, and it is (occasionally naps are required). But since she is not quite a year old, we call this dedication to change play. Play. That’s right. Learning new things and forming new neural networks in our brain to support these changes is the very stuff of child’s play.

So if my infant daughter has this much ability to change, to work, to be dedicated to new tasks like walking, talking and feeding herself, is this true of all humans? Or do we out grow it? It appears that we actually get a little complacent. Once we have tasks that we’ve mastered and routines that we have developed in life, these neural networks (patterns of how brain cells fire and work together) go on autopilot. A lot of times, we just go with it. We have tendency to forget that we created these patterns in the first place. 

For us older (and more tired) adults we need a bit of push to make changes. Really this means that we need to focus our attention on what we want to do differently and intentionally make this change, going against old patterns that fire off automatically within our brain. So yes, there is the work part of it: intentionally saying, “I will do this thing differently” and following through.

It’s January 3rd. There are a lot of folks out there embarking on some sort of life change. Right now, you need to build momentum. You need to practice doing what you want differently. Lots of times. That takes conscious effort. Each time you do it, your brain works differently. You are creating new patterns. If you do it more and more, it becomes easier. I would call this momentum.

There is a mistaken belief that you can wait around and you will find the motivation to make a change. FALSE. That’s not how motivation works. It works in combination with its friend momentum. Motivation is the reward you reap from making the change and enjoying the new things you are learning. It’s noticing that you did something different and now feel different. Then you want to do it some more. That’s how motivation works.

If there’s a change worth making in your life, how might you approach it with the tenacity and playfulness of a child? How do you see exercise, cooking, spending time with family, or any other goal as a playful and fun part of your life?

There is something really inspiring about opening a fresh, clean calendar. I can see why people make New Year’s resolutions. It’s a great time for reflection. It’s healthy to want to improve a thing or two in our lives and make this next calendar year better than the one before. However, I find people go about the New Year’s resolution in an unhelpful way. We tend not to know how to motivate ourselves to make changes. Here are some thoughts on making a better resolution for 2012:

• Choose something that benefits you on a daily basis. One mistake is that we choose to make a change that will only be felt months from now (I want to look great in that dress I’m going to wear next July.). Or we decide to make a change to please other people (I want to lose weight for my spouse). Like it or not, that will not inspire you on a regular basis to make changes. Instead, picture a change that you will notice each day. Imagine what it feels like, what you will notice, and how it will improve your life. I want to be more organized at work. I’m picturing what it will be like to walk in the office and everything is put in the right place. That’s a big relief. I won’t have to dig through mountains of paper. I can picture how having less clutter helps me feel more clear, more relaxed. That visualization and getting in touch with how I want to feel helps with motivation.

• Identify exactly what this change is going to take. Outline the steps to get to your goal. For me, its going to take 10-15 minutes a day just putting things away. Ask yourself: Can I really do these steps? Modify your goal if the steps require more than you can do. If you are not realistic, it’s not going to work.

• Use positive reinforcement. If you are punitive with yourself, you will rebel against your own goals. If I start to criticize myself for all the times I slip a little with organization, I’m not going to feel very good about myself. I might start to believe that I can’t achieve the goal and give up. This is counterproductive. For tips on being more positive with yourself, check out my blog on giving yourself some credit.

• Put support and structure in place. When something is really important to me, I try to find a way to hold myself accountable. Sometimes I hire a professional to help me with my goal. Sometimes I sign up for a class or a group. Maybe I’ll even publish it in a blog (okay, this is the first time I’m trying it!). The idea is that you need some pushing, so you need to find a way to get this. Recently, some of my fellow gym-goers have been emailing to find out when I’m going to the gym. This is extra incentive, because if I tell someone I’m going, I really need to follow through. Get creative- find the right vehicle for support with your goal. It could be telling friends, posting it on Facebook, joining a structured program, finding a mentor, writing yourself a letter about why you are doing what you are doing. I’d love to hear if you have some ideas. Please comment or contact me.

• Give yourself some room. Allow for being sick, tired, or pouty. And then have a concrete plan for how to bounce back. Maybe you go by the 90% rule. For me, that means 9 out of 10 work days I try to put away my papers.

Good luck and Happy New Year!