The Charge: Activating the 10 Human Drives That Make You Feel by Burchard Brendon

Author:Burchard, Brendon [Burchard, Brendon]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Free Press
Published: 2012-05-14T21:00:00+00:00

Activator #1: Make Change About the Gains, Not the Losses

It’s important to reshape how you may be thinking about change, because so many people fear it that they simply suppress the drive. But doing so is catastrophic. When we stop activating the drive to change, life feels the opposite of expansive or exciting; it feels small, stagnant, boring. We feel “okay” about life, but with no changes to look forward to, we feel blasé. We wonder where our hunger and ambitions went. We sleep fine at night, but we miss the nights we used to lie awake dreaming of a bigger, bolder, brighter future. And if we ever do dream at night, we let our dreams die in the daylight, because we’ve lost the guts to make the necessary changes in our lives to go from here to there.

There are thousands of reasons why you might fear change and see it as a painful thing to be avoided at all costs. Maybe someone in your life died and thrust unwanted change on you too quickly. Maybe every time you got comfortable, the world threw you a curveball of crap for some reason. Maybe you never got what you wanted whenever you tried to make a change yourself. Maybe you’re just fearful of breaking routine or being judged. Some people even argue that you may fear change out of some biological programming.

I’ve activated change in people’s lives professionally for more than a decade, though, and I’ve come to realize this: People don’t fear change at all; in fact, most people even consciously pull for change. Rather, people fear what change will or won’t bring. Thus, it is in expectation that the demon of fear really resides.

It’s a no-brainer that some of us have linked up in our minds that change equals pain. But the subtle part of what I’ve learned is that it’s the expectation of three specific kinds of pain that makes us fear change. The first reason has to do with an expectation of loss. You imagine the upcoming change taking control of your life and stripping from you something you enjoy, love, or are comfortable with. You fixate on all the things you will lose once you make or experience the change. And because you expect to lose more than you gain, you become fearful, or unmotivated.

For example, say your boss announces that your position has changed and you’re being transferred to a new department. You can meet this news with any of three main emotions: curiosity, optimism, or fear of loss. If it’s fear, you focus intently on losing your nice office, losing the power you worked so hard to attain in this department, losing the chance to work with your favorite coworkers, losing the certainty of knowing what you’re supposed to do with your day. This expectation of loss is where all the damage is done.

Of course, bystanders in your life would rationalize, “Well, it might be for the better.” They tell you to be optimistic

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