Becoming the change agent of your life? What? Before I explain what a “Change Agent” is let’s think about the nature of change.
“They say that time changes things but actually you have to change them yourself.” Andy Warhol
Unfortunately change isn’t easy. Especially if you have been feeling overwhelmed by your situation and emotions for several years. We fear change and are tempted to cling onto the status quo even though that causes us pain. When we courageously take the first steps towards Creating A New, Beautiful And Courageous Existence, we frequently meet resistance from the people we love. They don’t realise that we NEED to change. Unfortunately, if that resistance is too great, we stop and slip back into that painful status quo.
To help us through these first challenges we need to become the change agent in our own change programme.
What is a Change Agent?
A change agent is an enthusiast for change who can pass on their enthusiasm on to others. Everyone is capable of great reactive change, but a minority are proactive by nature, relishing the challenge of change. If you struggle with change then reading “Who Moved My Cheese” is a great place to start changing your feelings about change.
Who moved my cheese?
I firmly believe that this is the best book ever written about change. So much so that I think it should be mandatory reading for EVERYONE. Rather than waxing lyrical here, I’ve found a great article published in the Washington Post celebrating the 20th years of the book’s first publication. You can read the article here.
If you are interested in buying a copy a link to Amazon.com is here. Depending on where you are based you might get a better deal if you search for the book on the Amazon website nearest your geographic location.
Becoming the change agent in your life
This basically means that you are saying you are 100% committed to the change. You become the light that inspires the people around you to so that they begin to support the changes that you are making. This is YOUR life and you have the right to make whatever changes you want to. This is NOT being selfish. On one level it is self-preservation. You are making changes so that you can survive what a child-centric world throws at you.
At the other extreme it is you making a conscious decision to learn how to thrive rather than simply survive. The people closest to you should love you enough to support you in this. Unfortunately, relationships are hard and need to be worked at. We will be looking at the challenges that relationships pose and how to come out the other side in the blogs published on Saturdays.
Qualities of a Change Agent
I will be exploring how to become an effective change agent in a future blog. When it is published, I will insert the link here.
Practice makes perfect
It’s all well and good writing about things in theory: however, we need to start applying what we learn. For today’s activity spend five minutes writing down your thoughts about change. Do you love the change and want to jump strait in? Are you excited by the idea of making changes yet worried about taking the first step(s)? Does the idea of making changes in your life fill you with dread? The first step to making changes in your life is to understand how you respond to change.
To help you keep track of all your work for the daily activities mentioned we have created a monthly diary for you to record your progress. To download your copy of “My January Canbace Diary” please click here.
Be kind to yourself …
In CANBACE friendship!
If anything I have written resonates I’d love to hear from you in the comments. I appreciate that this can be a difficult subject to speak openly about. If you don’t want me to publish your comment on the website, please let me know. I will keep your words private.
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