How Our Brain Fights Change!

Clients often come to me for help when they feel stuck or cannot get past an obstacle that they have in their career or in their lives. In most situations what I uncoverwith the client, often right in the sessionis that they are stuck in a paradigm that they cannot get past and are often unable to extricate themselves from their situation by embracing a new mindset. Going from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset requires first an awareness of its existence. It then requires also the ability and openness to find ways to re-program your brain (your mind, really) to deal with the new reality.

Although I see this in my everyday work when I help clients overcome their resistance to change by providing a variety of tools that are appropriate to their specific needs for a change, what drove this point home in a dramatic way for me was when I watched this video of a person trying to ride a bike that is rigged to trick your brain. A slight change in the way its mechanism operated made it impossible for this person, well versed in riding ordinary bikes, to ride this one. You can see this is in the embedded video:

https://youtu.be/MFzDaBzBlL0

How does this apply to our everyday experiences? It applies in a consistent way when we are dealing with change. A typical change curve goes through a setback that results in a persons inability to continue after the onset of change in the same way as they did, before the change initiated. If the person accepts this and stays with the program then they go through the Deny, Deal, Develop, Deliver cycle, where each step successively brings them closer to the end stage of success, when the change is complete and they are able to deliver a positive outcome based on that change.

The Denial stage is when your mind thinks that the change is an illusion and that it will go away by ignoring it. If you persists and fight that urge to quit and stay with the program then you enter the Deal stage, where you develop coping mechanisms to overcome the negative forces that fight the change. In this zone you are still fighting the negative forces and you perform below your optimal level, but moving up in performance towards an acceptable level. During the Develop stage you create your own strategies that equip you to fight the still lingering negative forces until you finally overcome them when you reach the Delivery stage. This end stage often results in a better overall state after the change is complete than before the change was initiated.

This change curvethe Deny, Deal, Develop, Deliver cycleis apparent in how this person required some eight months to re-learn how to ride the trick bike. In the first attempts his brain was in in Denial over how the steering worked, but then he retrained his brain to accept the new way and he was able to master it in due time. As the video shows children are much more resilient to making a change that adults are.

So, if you have embarked on a new path that requires you to change your old habits use this video as a vivid example and as a metaphor to teach your brain (and mind) how it must deal with the process of change.

Good luck!

About Author

Dilip has distinguished himself as LinkedIn’s #1 career coach from among a global pool of over 1,000 peers ever since LinkedIn started ranking them professionally (LinkedIn selected 23 categories of professionals for this ranking and published this ranking from 2006 until 2012). Having worked with over 6,000 clients from all walks of professions and having worked with nearly the entire spectrum of age groups—from high-school graduates about to enter college to those in their 70s, not knowing what to do with their retirement—Dilip has developed a unique approach to bringing meaning to their professional and personal lives. Dilip’s professional success lies in his ability to codify what he has learned in his own varied life (he has changed careers four times and is currently in his fifth) and from those of his clients, and to apply the essence of that learning to each coaching situation. After getting his B.Tech. (Honors) from IIT-Bombay and Master’s in electrical engineering(MSEE) from Stanford University, Dilip worked at various organizations, starting as an individual contributor and then progressing to head an engineering organization of a division of a high-tech company, with $2B in sales, in California’s Silicon Valley. His current interest in coaching resulted from his career experiences spanning nearly four decades, at four very diverse organizations–and industries, including a major conglomerate in India, and from what it takes to re-invent oneself time and again, especially after a lay-off and with constraints that are beyond your control. During the 45-plus years since his graduation, Dilip has reinvented himself time and again to explore new career horizons. When he left the corporate world, as head of engineering of a technology company, he started his own technology consulting business, helping high-tech and biotech companies streamline their product development processes. Dilip’s third career was working as a marketing consultant helping Fortune-500 companies dramatically improve their sales, based on a novel concept. It is during this work that Dilip realized that the greatest challenge most corporations face is available leadership resources and effectiveness; too many followers looking up to rudderless leadership. Dilip then decided to work with corporations helping them understand the leadership process and how to increase leadership effectiveness at every level. Soon afterwards, when the job-market tanked in Silicon Valley in 2001, Dilip changed his career track yet again and decided to work initially with many high-tech refugees, who wanted expert guidance in their reinvention and reemployment. Quickly, Dilip expanded his practice to help professionals from all walks of life. Now in his fifth career, Dilip works with professionals in the Silicon Valley and around the world helping with reinvention to get their dream jobs or vocations. As a career counselor and life coach, Dilip’s focus has been career transitions for professionals at all levels and engaging them in a purposeful pursuit. Working with them, he has developed many groundbreaking approaches to career transition that are now published in five books, his weekly blogs, and hundreds of articles. He has worked with those looking for a change in their careers–re-invention–and jobs at levels ranging from CEOs to hospital orderlies. He has developed numerous seminars and workshops to complement his individual coaching for helping others with making career and life transitions. Dilip’s central theme in his practice is to help clients discover their latent genius and then build a value proposition around it to articulate a strong verbal brand. Throughout this journey, Dilip has come up with many groundbreaking practices such as an Inductive Résumé and the Genius Extraction Tool. Dilip owns two patents, has two publications in the Harvard Business Review and has led a CEO roundtable for Chief Executive on Customer Loyalty. Both Amazon and B&N list numerous reviews on his five books. Dilip is also listed in Who’s Who, has appeared several times on CNN Headline News/Comcast Local Edition, as well as in the San Francisco Chronicle in its career columns. Dilip is a contributing writer to several publications. Dilip is a sought-after speaker at public and private forums on jobs, careers, leadership challenges, and how to be an effective leader.

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