Enacting Values-Based Change by David W. Jamieson Allan H. Church & John D. Vogelsang

Author:David W. Jamieson, Allan H. Church & John D. Vogelsang
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Springer International Publishing, Cham

Doing Shapes Being: Habit Formation

We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.

—John Dryden

For my clients, the idea of creating change through behavior modification is familiar territory. It is the approach of policy change, legislation, and enforcement action. A critical decision to do things differently can lead to new ways of thinking and feeling, create the conditions for change, or at minimum, eliminate egregious offense. In the language of neuroplasticity, “neurons that fire together, wire together.” So, the practice of new behavior can create new habit in action and thought (Duhigg, 2012). For example, the practice of using African American to describe people previously known as Black, colored, Negro, and worse is one such example. People say “N-word” in polite company to indicate their internalized awareness of the negative connotations and their distancing themselves from association with such thoughts.

Still, the client focus on quick results makes the pursuit of embedded habit, let alone mastery, challenging. The idea of sustained deliberate practice can seem like so much time wasted when results are needed now. What is not recognized is that acting for immediate results is itself a doing that shapes a longer-term habit. Clients pursue the immediate at the expense of the ultimate without seeing the immediate as creating the ultimate. They want long-term results with short-term efforts. While occasionally possible, the greater success that comes from perseverance is often missed.

Yet a developmental approach can be less satisfying for list checkers and productivity measurers. Even if they acknowledge that the work of racial justice in particular, and equity in general, is an ongoing effort, they still bring their doing, short-term approach to the work. Moreover, deliberate effort is difficult to sustain without some indication of progress lest despair sets in. Consequently, I engage clients in identifying the ultimate results that they want. Most often they can say what they do not want—end oppression, stop racial injustice—but are hard pressed to describe in vivid detail the end state that they are working toward. Some even see doing so as a luxury they cannot afford rather that an essential and often implicit driver of their work. To address this challenge, I work with two types of indicators—those identified in advance and those that emerge.

Predetermined indicators

The first step is identifying the vision of success—a description of the conditions that will exist when they no longer have a need for this work. Most critical here is an affirmative vision—not the absence of racism, the end of prejudice and oppression—but a positively stated, felt expression of an envisioned future reality. We acknowledge that they will not likely see their vision made real any more than early abolitionists who sought full citizenship for slaves lived to see their aspirations realized. Yet clients’ ability to identify their true north is essential to directing their daily work. From the vision, the goals and success markers can be identified as substantial contributions toward the vision. In this way, we establish that no matter how long or short the

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