Principles for a good life

Art and electronics

Change is difficult. Everyone knows. But why?

It has to do with how our brain works and learns. Up to a certain age, learning is easy and fast, and changes occur at record speed. Try to keep track of the amount of things a baby learns in his first year: crawling, walking, talking, threading things, pressing buttons, using a spoon, holding a bottle. He seems to have a new skill every day. Really at this age the brain acts like a sponge, because it is not yet shaped, everything new, every feeling, emotion, skill, are absorbed very quickly.

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Then it stops. The brain closes to changes. Notice how an year-old baby has suddenly abandonment anxiety . Everychange is accepted with resistance. Then also comes the awful two-year-old, where the prevailing answer is "No!" for everything ... True, there are other psychological processes that toddlers go through, but in the context of dealing with change, the brain begins to set patterns for itself. Like trails in the snow: At first when the snow is clean, you can take any trail, everything is open. After a few times we have skied down the same hill, grooves begin to form, and the tendency will be to get into these paths and deepen them.

The brain develops some efficacy, thus it remembers patterns and usually after learning them, does not invest energy when it becomes automatically. Our habits are like this, we almost do not need to invest thought, they occur alone. Therefore every change in our routine, from what we know, will require mental energy. Our brain mind opposes it, initially because it requires effort, and it is the opposite of efficiency...

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It is therefore important to understand what we go through when we encounter change, big or small. When we increase awareness, coping will be less "automatic" (i.e. resisting). We will know that change has a defined process, it takes time, requires dealing with intense emotions, it has stages, and in the end it is over ...

All this when we face change ourselves ...

What happens when we want to lead change, small or large, that involves people around us?

The process is even more difficult, because different people are involved ... There is a way to manage such a process effectively. First of all understand the process that people go through, secondly, understand needs and anticipate problems, and prepare accordingly.

The links on the side have two presentations that I gave at the time in a special program at the College of Education on the subject of leading change.

The first explains how to deal with change, what are the steps to change and a little more detail on how our brain works. The second is about leading change and building strategy to lead the change.

In the presentations you will also find references for recommended books.

Pleasant change!

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