Change or Die….

The world has become impossible; I cannot live in this world. Have you said these words to yourself before? So what are you waiting for? Do you think the world will change for you? Or are you the one who should change? If you do not find clear answers to all of these questions, here is the story that is repeated in life every day.

A falcon is the longest bird in life. It lives up to 70 years. But for a falcon to live to this age, he has to make a difficult decision when he reaches 40 years. His fingernails, which were characterized by elasticity, are unable to hold prey, and they are the source of their food. Its wings also become heavy due to the heavy weight of its feathers and stick to the chest, and flying becomes very difficult for him; These conditions put the falcon in front of two options: either to surrender to death or to subject himself to a painful change process that lasts 150 days!!

The process requires that the falcon fly to the top of the mountain to where it lives, and there the falcon hitting its beak on a rock so that its curved head is broken, when the front of the beak is finished breaking, the falcon waits until the beak grows again. Then he breaks his claws as well, and after the falcon’s talons grow, he starts plucking his old feathers and after five months the falcon flies on its new journey as if he was born again and lives another 30 years.

 In his book “The Three Keys to Change at Work and in Life”,  Alan Deutschman asks the question, “Could you change when change matters most?” It is a fact that five behavioral issues drive the large majority of the health care budget in the United States. They are too much smoking, drinking, and eating; too much stress and not enough exercise. If potentially only one out of every ten people can change our behaviors, even in a crisis, then what hope do any of us really have?

Deutschman suggests that there is a way to effect meaningful, using three keys to change:

The First Key to Change

RELATE: You form a new, emotional relationship with a person or community that inspires and sustains hope. The leader or community has to sell you on yourself and make you believe you have the ability to change. They have to sell you on themselves as your partners, mentors, role models, or sources of new knowledge. And they have to sell you on the specific methods or strategies that they employ.

The Second Key to Change

REPEAT: The new relationship helps you learn, practice, and master the new habits and skills that you’ll need. It takes a lot of repetition over time before new patterns of behavior become automatic and seem natural – until you act the new way without even thinking about it.

The Third Key to Change

REFRAME: The new relationship helps you learn new ways of thinking about your situation and your life. Ultimately, you look at the world in a way that would have been so foreign to you that it wouldn’t have made any sense before you changed.

These are the three keys to change: relate, repeat, and reframe. New hope, new skills, and new thinking.

Why is it that even though people spend billions of dollars every year to change and improve, yet so often they still fail to realize their goals? Deutschman contends that “the reason isn’t that they don’t want to change or can’t change but rather that they don’t understand change or have the right tools to effect it.“

In conclusion, we must remember that the world will not change for our sake, but we must change, and in many cases change becomes inevitable and not a luxury, and therefore you should not wait and start from now, as the saying goes:

“Yesterday is a History, Tomorrow is Mystery, and Today is a Gift”. So do not miss the opportunity !!