How to make meaningful change
Before we get started, I should mention that various versions of this piece have been sitting in my Drafts folder for at least three months. I am not, by any measure, a preeminent expert on the topic of personal growth; quite the opposite, in fact. I can be highly avoidant when it comes to making certain kinds of change. Working on this piece kept making me anxious about that. So—emotional genius that I am—I kept not writing it.
Then I realized that my very aversion to initiating change is what makes me uniquely qualified to deliver this message. Sort of the way the best math teachers are those who didn’t do well at math in school, because people who are really good at math can’t get why some find it so hard.
I’m not totally change averse; I’ve made some pretty big and potentially scary steps without too much difficulty over the years. Then why is it so damned hard other times? I decided to go looking for answers. How do people who effectively make change do it? How have I effectively done it in the past? Here is the advice that has worked for me.
