Monday, May 20, 2019

The anxiety of change

Over the years, I have seen multiple changes in my life and one thing which is constant in every change that i go through is that there is some anxiety before the change happens. Also, the more important thing is that once the change is done - the anxiety vanishes away and in most cases it is replaced by a sense of pride and comfort. So despite the experience of having survived through most changes, why do we still feel it?

a. Comfort zone - Over a period, every zone that we get into becomes our comfort zone. There is always a strong bias towards the current situation and bias against change. Something which generally looks like a change for the good also invariably faces opposition of mind as there are millions of reasons why a new area of life might feel non comfortable

b. Fear of failure - We always fear that any new thing will lead us to failure and due to this fear we tend to avoid doing it. Even though, if we know that it might not be exactly very difficult and we can do it very easily

c. Negativity bias - Even though, you would have gone through 100 changes in life and only 1 was unpleasant, we tend to remember that 1 incident and forget the 99 good ones and dwell a lot into it and thus making ourselves anxious to change

d. Challenges and opportunities - Every change brings with it some challenges, we tend to over think about them prior to the change and hence feel that the challenges actually seem much bigger than they actually are


The best ways to survive through these are as follows:

a. Opportunities - Every change brings opportunities. However bad it may seem, it has an opportunity to either learn, grow, win or test yourself. Also, in most cases the changes that happen have more good than bad, and still we are anxious. Focus on the opportunities rather than the challenges.

b. Knowing the negative bias - Always know that negative bias is a mind problem and not real. We have gone through millions of changes in life and in most cases we have succeed. The past changes have made us what we are. Change is an opportunity for you to move ahead and become a better individual. You can either have a simple life and die or you can have all the adventures and excitements and varieties and then die.

c. Creating a success imagination - Always create a positive imagination of how much good things will happen once you go through the change. That will keep you motivated and focused and also ensure that the anxiety vanishes away.

d. Belief in a bigger power - Always believe that there are bigger powers at work and you are a mere manifestation of that power. Always believe that god will eventually make everything right for you. That eliminates a lot of fear.

e. Focusing on the greater good - Always focus on the benefits that you will achieve once that happens. Also, remember that had humans decided not to change, we would have still lived in the caves. Every change brings progress and every progress ensures that the future gets a better life than the past.

f. Imaginary heroes - Always think of how your imaginary heroes have handled these situations. Suppose you lose a relative then remind yourself that harry potter had no parents, or if you lose a job, remember how college dropouts created successful businesses. We admire the heroes as they went through all the hardships before making it up there. You must try and be a hero yourself - go through the pain if the need be and win in it.

g. Focus on the moment - Always remember, the mind has a weakness where it focuses a lot on smaller problems and magnifies them to make them appear much more difficult than they actually are. Also, things in the past and future always seem more frightening or happy than they actually were. Its important to understand this and simply focus on the moment so that we avoid this weakness of magnification.

Always remember, whatever the situation, whatever the change - you have it in you to be able to live through it. So embrace it, and face it when it comes - Dont think of it now and create anxiety or fear.


No comments: