One of the more common questions I have asked myself in the past and that has continually been asked of me is “Can change happen in an instant?” but when we talk about change what are we really saying? Change for most of us really means changing something physical, like the color of our hair or how fat we are, or changing an occurrence or an event like what may be happening to us in our lives, like getting out of debt. But isn’t it true that what we really want to change is not about something physical or an event? What it actually boils down to is that we all desire to change either or behaviours or how we feel about things.
I had struggled in the past with changing things in my life and I did the same things most of us do and believed the same things. What I have realize is, we all grow up believing that for things to change they must take a reasonably long period of time. That’s what society expects and hence that’s how we respond. Another reason why we don’t change quickly is that many of us have tried time and time again to make changes through the power of our will but failed over and over again. We assume that the important changes in their lives must take a long time and be very difficult to make. But it’s only difficult because most people have no idea of how to change. They have no effective strategy. Will power alone will not be sufficient nor effective enough, certainly not if we desire long lasting change.
For most people instant change really means that you never actually had a problem at all. If you can change things so easily, then why didn’t you change from yesterday, or two weeks ago, or a year ago and not go through all the complaining and frustrations.
Consider this, how soon after the end of a deeply romantic relationship can someone begin to feel different and recover from the loss? Most people would answer a couple of months to years, but the truth is that physically we possess the capability to do it in less than a day. Why then don’t most people do this? The answer is that in our culture the belief is that we need to grieve for a particular period of time. How long is this time period to grieve? That will depend on your way of forming associations. So if the day after the breakup you were laughing and having a good time wouldn’t people begin to believe that you never loved nor cared about the person you were with. You may even begin to also feel the same way those people feel, as this would be inline with what your cultural associations or conditioning are.
Whenever someone has experienced a tragedy like loss of a job, eviction from your home, lack of self confidence, they will continue to experience pain until they change the sensation they link to themselves and these events or situations.
It is possible for all our changes to happen in an instant but what happens to most people is that they wait until certain things occur before they finally decide to make a shift.
For us to believe we are going to create a change now we must first believe that ‘we can change now’. This goes against what most people in society believe because we associate so much pain and distress to the thought of changing quickly. So we want to change quickly but society says if we do we never had a problem at all. It is therefore very important that we believe we can change now for it will determine the actions we are willing to take and also gets us ready to change.
The next belief we must have in order to create long lasting change is that the responsibility for our change is ours and no one else’s. In order for us to take the responsibility we must be convinced that something must change, not should change, not ought to change, or could change but without a shadow of a doubt must change. We are all guilty of statements like “I should go back to school” or “I should start a business” but you and I can “should” or “could” or “ought” all we want but our lives will not have changed. It’s only when we make something a must that the process of doing what’s necessary to alter the quality of our lives will begin.
Now we must not just believe that something must change but also that ‘we must change it’. If you don’t see yourself as the source of the change, then you will be looking for someone else to do it for you hence we will have someone else to blame if things go wrong and don’t work out. We must be the source of our change if change is going to be permanent.
We must also have the belief that ‘we can change it’. If you don’t believe it’s possible to change then you stand no chance of carrying through on your desires. Unless you have this basic belief there is little doubt that any change you make is likely to be only temporarily.
If you don’t have these main beliefs then any kind of change you may have achieved is likely to be a temporary one. That may be a hard pill to swallow but no matter what you do or whom you get to help you if you do not possess these main beliefs then you are wasting your time.
An important point to make here is that succeeding in making long-term change requires the immediate reinforcement of that change. It makes no sense to have changed a behaviour and then two days later we find ourselves doing the same thing again. I’m sure you would not plan your day once and then say you have beaten procrastination forever, no, no, no you have to keep doing it everyday.
So if you are going through each day thinking that change cannot happen in an instant, perish that though. Change is all about you and the association you have to changing now.
Vladimir Murray is a father of two boys, runs his own internet marketing business and enjoys helping others improve their lives. To learn more about personal development and the Science of Getting Rich and how to apply it to your life then Vladimir recommends Bob Proctor’s SGR Program. For info Click Here!
Tags: bob proctor, changing behaviours, motivation, science of getting rich, Self Esteem, sgr program, success
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