Do you know someone you’d like to change? I will guess that you answered yes and that you’re probably thinking of more than one person.
The reality is that we CAN’T change others. But what we can do is change ourselves. Changing YOU is much easier than trying to make someone else change.
If you’d like an exercise to work through this process, here is what I suggest from personal experience. Make a list of the people that you want to change. Then, decide what you can do to change yourself in that relationship, and ultimately, how that relationship functions and feels.
But what happens if there is nothing that you can do personally?
Well, if that person is bringing consistent negativity to your world, it might be that the person just isn’t a good fit for your life. Consider if that person is important enough to figure out some type of solution (even if it takes a lot of work). If that person is a parent or boss, call me. We’ll talk about it. One caveat here: people can change, but they need to want to change.
Here is a quote by Confucius:
“Don’t complain about the snow on your neighbor’s roof when your own doorstep is unclean.” – Confucius
On a similar note, I was jumping around on LinkedIn the other day and also found this quote on Brene Brown’s page:
“Sometimes the very evils that we want to fight in the world, the broken behaviors we blame on others, are also alive in us and in need of our attention, our kindness, our understanding, our healing. Sometimes what we long to see change in the world is an inside job.” – Elizabeth Lesser
It’s time to get started on that list!
Life is good.
Jeff