Mind Gym (8 page)

One way to spot how proactive or reactive you are is to notice the way you think about a situation. Imagine that you are frustrated because your boss keeps changing her mind and makes unreasonable demands of you. Here are some different ways to think about this problem, split between a focus on being out of control and a focus on being in control.

Of course, it’s easier to find oneself in the “Out of Control” column. In the short term, it may even be necessary—for example, when someone grieves the death of a friend or relative. However, if you stay in that column, the situation is probably going to get worse. Choose the “In Control” column and you are much more likely to improve the situation.

Going for a run three times a week may be hard work to start with, but it will make you fitter than slouching in front of the TV. In the same way, focusing your energy on what is in your control will make you more proactive, less stressed, and far more likely to achieve your goals.

Are there times when nothing can be done? Not many. Sometimes, it’s true, there is very little that you can do. Yet even when a problem seems too big to tackle, or so big that your efforts might not make a difference, there are still things you can do.

For example, imagine that you’re extremely concerned about the damage being done to the environment. While it is true that no single action you take will resolve the environmental problems in our world, a few actions on your part can make a big difference. You could

   
•   vote for the political candidate or party that supports your cause,

   
•   buy products that are environmentally friendly,

   
•   recycle,

   
•   write to newspapers, bloggers, and companies that share your concerns,

   
•   invest exclusively in environmentally friendly funds, or

   
•   take part in peaceful protests.

These actions aren’t going to lead to an immediate or enormous difference in the hole in the ozone layer or instantly replant the Amazonian rain forests, but they are more likely to help than your doing nothing at all.

There’s always something you can do to impact or positively change a problem. But the hardest step is often just understanding that your mind-set is limiting your action.

GIVE YOUR MIND A WORKOUT

1. Next time you sit down for a chat with a friend, listen carefully to what he or she says and try to determine where their locus of control tends to be: external (reactive) or internal (proactive). You will hear people using a reactive mind-set when

      •   they describe their worries as being outside their control,

      •   they blame others for the situation they find themselves in, or

      •   they avoid taking action.

If someone is doing two or all three of these, they probably have an external locus of control.

2. As you start to talk about what is going on in your life, see if you can spot where your locus of control is. Listen to yourself talk to a friend about what is going on in your life and reflect on what you say and how you say it.

3. Take the time to reflect on how you view your life. Do you see a lot of challenges that you cannot solve, or do you see opportunities for creative solutions? Do you feel out of control, or do you feel ready to tackle the challenges? Are you someone who procrastinates because doing anything feels futile? The answers to these questions will clue you in as to where your locus of control lies. If you have an external locus of control—you feel reactive and out of control—how is this affecting your life? In other words, what are you
not doing
because you think you can’t make a difference to the outcome?

1. Take a blank sheet of paper. At the top, write down an issue that is on your mind and you want to address.

2. Draw a vertical line down the middle of the page. In the left column, write down all the aspects of this issue that are bothering you and you cannot control. In the right column, write down all the things you could do that might have an impact.

3. Circle of few of the things you can do to have an impact and put a date next to each for when you will take action on it.

4. Take action!

Often when people complete this exercise, they are surprised by how much they can put in the right column. A long list will give you the confidence to take control of the situation and make useful things happen.

Y
ou’re sitting in your rocking chair on the terrace of your beach home, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and watching the sun set with a glass of wine by your side. With your 100th birthday only a few weeks away, you’re reflecting on your life and recalling how the major decisions you made at different stages affected the course it followed. You remember the day you chose to move to California, the struggle to get a job as a writer, the naysayers who told you it was a waste of your time, your chance meeting with the woman who quickly became the love of your life. As you reflect, you realize that doing the things others told you were impossible became the most prized moments of your life.

A few weeks later, as your entire family gathers for your 100th birthday, one of your daughters asks you to give advice to all your grandchildren and great-grandchildren. And you decide to share the reflections.

“My advice to all of you is to understand that there is very little in life you can’t do,” you say to your family. “The choice we all have is between
will
and
won’t
, instead of
can
and
can’t
. Sure, people tend to say they can’t do something or you can’t do something. But that just disguises the fact that there is still a choice that can be made—in almost all situations. There is always a choice. What people actually mean is they
won’t
do something or they
don’t want
you to do something. You always have the option.”

This difference in attitude between “can’t” and “won’t” is a subtle but vital one, because it indicates whether you feel responsible for your actions and your future. In fact, the existentialist philosophers, led by Jean-Paul Sartre and Martin Heidegger, were the first significant body of thinkers to claim that humankind is totally free and totally responsible for its actions. This may sound less radical now than it did in the middle of the twentieth century. But it is much more radical than many of us allow when we consider how to improve our lives.

Today, our lives are full of rules, guidelines, and principles that we have invented, or have been invented for us, to help us make choices but also to provide us with excuses for poor decisions. And although they may masquerade as immutable laws, they are more like local bylaws, which are often outdated, irrelevant, and just plain wrong.

Here are a few you may have come across or live your life by:

   
•   Job security is greater at larger, well-known companies.

   
•   If you want a successful career, you must have a college degree.

   
•   You are more likely to get divorced if there is a large age gap between you and your partner.

   
•   People who finish at the top of their class get the best jobs.

Much of our upbringing is filled with threats about the horrible things that will happen if we don’t stick to the rules. Santa Claus won’t visit us if we’re naughty. The bogeyman will get us if we’re out past curfew. This carries into later life, when we are fearful that our friends or family won’t approve of us or our motives will be misunderstood.

For those of you who tend to be swayed by irrational fear, your regrets are often based on the things you didn’t do and the opportunities you didn’t take:
Why didn’t I leave the firm once I was qualified for a better job? Why didn’t I take the chance to go to Memphis when I had it? How different would my life have been if I’d proposed to her that night on the boat?

Others amongst us suffer from irrational exuberance. These people might be described—especially by those with irrational fears—as not having their feet firmly on the ground. The regrets they are most likely to have are along the lines of
Why did I rush into that?

Some of the small businesses that collapse every year are started by people with irrational exuberance who didn’t think through the decision they were making. Irrational exuberance is similar to undiluted optimism (which we described in chapter 2). We all know people who make quick and risky decisions at the drop of a hat.

The irony, of course, is that each type, whether fearful or exuberant, encourages the other. A megafailure for an irrational exuberant provides evidence to someone with irrational fear that their fear is well justified.
See what happens if you give up a good job?
Equally, to the irrational exuberant, the sight of someone unhappily stuck in a rut is evidence that they have nothing to fear but fear itself.
Oh, they may be secure financially, but look how unhappy they are
.

Irrational exuberants are, however, the exceptions in our society. Due to our upbringing,
¹
most of us are much more likely to be worried about failing or letting someone down than we are to take risks and not worry about the consequences.

This chapter will help you get better at making life’s big decisions. There are tips in here for those who are used to saying
I wish I hadn’t
, but the majority of advice is for those who want to avoid looking back and saying
If only
or
I wish I had
.

As we intentionally make changes in our lives, all humans go through psychological steps. A helpful way of illustrating these steps is with the grandly named “existential cycle,” which has four stages: doing, contemplating, preparing, and experimenting.
²

These four stages are much like exercises in risk management. No one wants to look back on his or her life at some point and say
I wish I would have
or
If only I had
. The existential cycle helps you process life-changing decisions, such as getting a new job, getting married, or moving to a new city or country.

The first stage, “doing,” is where you spend most of your life: It is your settled, equilibrium position. The doing may be all sorts of things—writing emails, riding horses, reading books, washing up, going to meetings, listening to lectures, cooking, dancing, running, sharing stories with friends, telling jokes, or making love. Of course, these are not done all at the same time (not unless you’re really talented). Whatever the activity may be, and however enjoyable or dull it is, you are doing it and it tends to keep you occupied.

Sometimes you get around to the next stage in the cycle, “contemplating,” and consider whether or how things could be different.
I wonder what life would be like if we moved to California or Florida? Do I really want to be an accountant for the rest of my life? Am I leading a “good” life?

Occasionally you move on from contemplating to “preparing,” the next stage in the cycle. You search on the web for real estate agents in San Diego or Key West, find out what property prices are, check weather patterns, possibly even visit your preferred destination on your next vacation. You have moved beyond imagining how things could be different to investigating the practical options for how to make them different.

The next stage is actually making the change. You leave your job, buy a house, and move all your possessions. This stage is called “experimenting.” After you’ve settled in and started the beachside bar you’d dreamed about, this becomes your normal way of living, and you are once again in a state of doing. The cycle in itself is not complicated. The challenge is moving through it at the right pace and in the right way.

As you travel around your cycle, you will have conversations with yourself that stop you from moving on to the next stage and instead take you back to doing.