Change is possible. But seldom does it begin where the majority believes it does.
What must change, you are likely aware of.
You know yourself; you’ve known yourself for a long time. It is not a secret as to which version of yourself you wish to be. It is the one who makes it happen.
The one that is actually there in the discussion as opposed to somewhere else in the head.
To have known that a gap exists and to be unable to bridge it, that is what no one discusses quite plainly.
The Gap Is Real. The Reasons for It Are Usually Not What You Think.
Whenever individuals believe that they are not being what they would like to be, willpower is the first resort. More discipline. Better systems. A stricter routine.
Then something slips, and the entire thing goes down and the story becomes: I just don’t have what it takes to change.
The conclusion is hardly ever true. What is generally occurring is that older and less visible than there is an issue with willpower.
Individuals bring with them patterns of their previous stages of life, patterns of responding to stress, to conflict, to being overwhelmed by it.
Such patterns do not step aside in order to allow you to do better. They work below the conscious intention.
You may desire to do something different, and you may still find yourself doing the same thing, almost unconsciously, in the times when it counts the most.
This is what makes a person be able to switch jobs, cities, relationships, and even feel that they are having the same experience. The circumstances shifted. The pattern didn’t.
The real effect of self-criticism.
When individuals are found falling into old habits, the reaction is to self-pity over it. This resembles responsibility but is really not.
Studies on behavior change indicate that severe self-criticism promotes avoidance – individuals withdraw further from what they are attempting to do because interacting with it is like inviting further punishment.
To become who you want to be (or become the version of yourself you are proud of), you must remain in the room with what is difficult about you, until you actually know it.
You cannot do that and at the same time tear yourself apart.
Getting Specific About Who You’re Actually Trying to Become
Many individuals have a very hazy vision of the individual they are striving to be.
“More confident.” “A better partner.”
These are not bad things to desire, but too abstract to pursue.
That is not the question that would help you the most: what does that version of you do differently in certain circumstances?
What do you do when you feel like punishing yourself on the days when you have made a mistake and cannot undo whatever you have done?
It is those practical situations.
Some questions that tend to surface honest answers.
- The last time you felt like yourself, not acting, not running anything, but just being? And what was the difference in that situation?
- What is it you are not saying in a relationship that is important to you?
- What would you do differently this year without waiting until you feel ready?
These are not pleasant questions. They are more practical than any goal-setting exercise, however, since they are oriented toward something real as opposed to something ideal.
Why the Inner Work Can’t Be Skipped
There is a type of personal development that is solely about the exterior: routines, habits, productivity systems, and the way you organize your time.
These things have value.
And yet they are sitting on something. And when what lies beneath is hostile, the higher work usually will not stand the ground.
Psychological and emotional well-being determines everything. What energy do you really possess?
You can either be able to stay uncomfortable long enough to go through it, or you may have to avoid it.
The way you interpret the actions of other individuals and the ability to remain controlled in situations when something seems threatening.
Depression, trauma, grief, and anxiety are not allowed to remain in their lanes. They affect choices that people are not aware are being affected.
An individual who has been running on nothing in the last two years and passes it off as discipline is not prospering; they’re coping.
There exists a difference, though it does not appear like it.
Patterns that keep people stuck.
A few things come up often in the work of changing:
- Being so occupied that one will never get time to check what is really happening. One of the better ways that people avoid themselves is busyness.
- Waiting till you are prepared, or till things become less disturbed, or till some other circumstance is fulfilled before.
- Attempting to change without another person involved to look at what you cannot look at yourself.
What Change Actually Looks and Feels Like
It’s slower than people expect and less dramatic than the way it gets described. There’s rarely a single turning point. There’s mostly just a gradual shift in which the same situations start going a little differently, and you start noticing that they are.
You handle something without the usual fallout. You say the thing you would have swallowed before. You stay in a hard conversation instead of shutting down. You catch yourself mid-pattern and choose something else, not every time, but more often than before.
That’s what progress looks like up close. It’s not a transformation. It’s a direction.
What tends to make it last.
- Addressing what’s actually getting in the way, rather than working around it indefinitely.
- Having somewhere to process things honestly, which most people don’t have as consistently as they need.
- Giving yourself enough time. Real change isn’t measured in weeks.
- Not treating every setback as evidence that change isn’t possible. Setbacks are part of the process, not proof the process has failed.
The people who get to the version of themselves they’re proud of are not the ones who had the most willpower or the best plan. They’re mostly the ones who kept going when it was slow and unglamorous, and who had the honesty and humility to get some help along the way.
Get Support
There’s a stubborn idea that serious, lasting change should happen on your own.
Working on yourself in isolation means you’re limited to your own perspective on your own blind spots.
The patterns that are most in the way are usually the ones you’ve had the longest – the ones that feel like personality rather than behavior, the ones that don’t announce themselves because they’ve become the water you swim in.
A good therapist gives you something different: a relationship in which you can think more clearly than you can on your own.
You hear yourself differently in that context. You notice things that the speed of ordinary life doesn’t leave room to catch.
You start seeing the patterns rather than just living inside them.
Therapy is for anyone who recognizes the gap between where they are and where they want to be.
If you’ve been considering it and finding reasons to wait, it’s worth asking what, exactly, you’re waiting for.
Reach out to Compassionate Healthcare & Wellness Center today.