By Victoria Joanna  BBA, CNP, RNCP http://www.victoriajoanna.com/

Are you aware of your own power to change your life this instant?  Consider this, no matter what is happening in your life right now, you have the power to change your experiences. 

As a coach, my primary goal is to empower my clients with the tools necessary to create the results they want. One of the first steps in the process is understanding that you can choose how you feel, act and react to any circumstance or situation.  The power to choose comes from increasing one’s self-awareness.

My experience has shown that this is not always an easy concept to embrace.  This is especially true when we’re in a situation where we believe that someone, or something, needs to change in order for a particular area in our life to get better.   Hearing that it’s all up to us can often create resistance, defensiveness and anger.  We often perceive our circumstances as being caused by external factors.   While that is partially true, how we choose to react to them and the action we take or don’t take, is truly what has the largest impact on our experience. 

Part of the reason it’s initially difficult for us to think this way is that we tend to confuse choice and accountability with blame and responsibility.  We are not to “blame” for our circumstances nor are we “responsible” for everything that happens; but we do have “choice” and are “accountable” for our actions, perceptions and beliefs about what happens.

Many of us have been conditioned to see things from a certain perspective, as a result we wait for circumstances to change around us and until they do, we feel trapped, paralyzed and frustrated.  Our workload takes over our lives, our boss doesn’t provide enough support, our husband isn’t attentive or we just don’t have enough time to take care of our health.  We see all of these things as being beyond our control.  To the extent that we do so, we are powerless to change them.

Remember Gandhi’s famous quote “be the change you wish to see in the world.”  It resonates with so many people because it’s fundamentally true.  Change happens from within and begins with us.

When we start to see our life in this way, we will no longer be a victim of our circumstances and other people’s actions.  We will see that we have much more power than we realized and change is easier than it appears.   We don’t need to wait for permission to live a happier and more fulfilling life.

If you’re not used to seeing life from this perspective it can be a little tough to get started.  Here is an exercise you can do to begin changing your perspective.

Step 1:  Take something that is currently happening where you feel as if you don’t have the power to change it.  Write out the issue:  “I wish I could (or I wish I had, etc)… but I can’t or am unable to do so because…”

Step 2:  Make a list of all of the alternative choices/actions you would have available if nothing was standing in your way.

Step 3:  Now beside each choice or action, write down the reason you think it’s not a viable option for you at this time.

Step 4: For each of the objections you gave above, think of at least three reasons why that objection may not be 100% true.  This is the hard part.  You want to be right and you may be convinced these things are standing in your way.  Challenge yourself, if only hypothetically, to see your situation from different perspectives.  Remember….it can be partially true, but not 100%.  Just try to see that there might be a different way to see the situation.

Step 5:  Assuming that in step four you managed to convince yourself (or at least become open to the possibility) that your objections aren’t 100% true, looking at all of the reasons you’ve listed, ask yourself what might really be standing in the way of you making a different choice.  Is it fear, procrastination, self-doubt, lack of motivation?  Be honest with yourself.  Through this process you begin to shed light on your unconscious emotions and by gaining more understanding and self-awareness you will be able to make a different choice.