Have you ever made a decision and found, when it comes to following through, you really wish you hadn’t?
Recently one of my clients, let’s call her Anne, bought a house. That’s a HUGE thing to do, right?
She made an offer….contracts were exchanged…and it was nearly time to leave her old house and move in to the new one.
Suddenly she ‘realised’ it was all a big mistake; she should never have done it; she’s actually happy where she is; everything will be fine if things stay the same
In fact it’s NOT a big mistake. It’s just that part of changing something where it feels really messy. You’re out of your comfort zone. You’re in your stretch zone and it’s extremely uncomfortable.
Can you remember times like that? And then it turned out ok?
It looks like this (believe it or not this is my representation of The Change Curve)
You also get times when you are thrown into change – you don’t have any choice (like when a pandemic hits, or you get made redundant, or both). These times also follow the same pattern. There is usually frustration and grief. It’s messy and horrible. And then eventually you start coming up the other side; your life takes on a new form. Quite often you find you’re glad it happened because it allowed something else to happen that was better.
So next time you’re feeling rubbish about change, consider the possibility that you’re in the Messy bit. It may not be fun, but you won’t be there forever, and you can choose to see it as part of the discomfort of learning new and unfamiliar things, being out of your Comfort Zone and into your Stretch Zone. Sometimes just knowing that makes it all easier to deal with