If there's something in your life that hasn't changed, is it that you don't have the tools, or is it that you're not willing to change it? What comes first, a willingness to change or the tools to change it? You can go to therapy. You can do life coaching classes. You can pray. You can go to church. You can use whatever means, methods, or modalities to create change in your life. But no matter how many tools you have in the toolbox, nothing moves without the willingness to take action and the willingness to change it.
If there's something in your life that hasn't changed, is it that you don't have the tools, or is it that you're not willing to change it? What comes first, a willingness to change or the tools to change it? You can go to therapy. You can do life coaching classes. You can pray. You can go to church. You can use whatever means, methods, or modalities to create change in your life. But no matter how many tools you have in the toolbox, nothing moves without the willingness to take action and the willingness to change it.
Questions you can ask yourself:
- If you're looking at creating a life worth living and you're looking at making a change, how committed are you?
- What is that thing that you're not changing providing? What is it actually serving? What purpose does it have?
- What have I not been willing to change in relationships?
- What am I willing to be, do, have, create, and generate in my life? Is there anything that I'm not willing to be, do, have, create, or generate in your life?
An Exercise:
1. Make a list of what you have not been willing to change in your life. Ask yourself: What have I not been willing to change in relationships? Â What have I not been willing to change in my business? What have I not been willing to change with my money flows? What have I not been willing to change with my body? What have I not been willing to change with myself and my image, my personality?
2. Go through that list and have a look at, what purpose does that thing that you won't change serve? And the purpose it serves could be considered positive or negative. It doesn't matter, but just have a look at it.
3. What are you willing to be, do, have, create, and generate in your life? Is there anything that you are not willing to be, do, have, create, or generate in your life? And if there's anything that you're not willing to be, do, have, create, or generate, what is underneath that? What are you willing in your life? What are you unwilling in your life? Unpack it. Have a look at the exercise again.
Hello again. John Wheeler here with the Come Alive podcast, and it's been quite some time since I've recorded an episode. And recently, I have completed some trainings in a type of therapy called acceptance and commitment therapy, and it's got my wheels turning a bit. So, I wanted to do some podcast with some of the insights that I gained from that therapy that I really get could be used in everyday life to create a life worth living. So, I figure a good place to start this is what comes first, a willingness to change or the tools to change it?
And this hits more personally for me if I look at my business and I look at this podcast, for example, or the types of commitments that I have in my life or changing my body or changing finances, what's been interesting to see is to know that I have tools, to know that I'm an intelligent person, to know that I have trained myself well enough to know how to address change in my life. And with all that being said and having all of those skills and hopefully as you listen to this, you can apply this to you as well, like where are you intelligent and what have you trained yourself well in. But really looking at even with having all of the tools, even with having all of the education that you and I have, there are still areas of our life that we would like to change that we still see as difficult, or even if we don't see this difficult, we're actually choosing not to change it. So, I've been really looking at this idea of willingness to change because the reality is you can have all the education in the world. You can go to therapy.
You can do life coaching classes. You can pray. You can go to church. You can use whatever means, methods, modalities that you know to create change in your life. But no matter how many tools you have in the toolbox, without the willingness to take action and the willingness to change it, nothing moves.
So, I've been looking with acceptance and commitment therapy. There are particular principles that he discusses within this type of framework and looks at all of the different areas in which we are human, basically, where we all have basic yearnings is what he calls them. And I I'm planning to do a podcast on each of the yearnings because each of them has their own flaws and their own rewards, for lack of better phrasing, of what each can do and how those things have showed up. It's all very much based on evolutionary science, which I think is why I was attracted to it. But it all comes down to one thing.
If you're looking at creating a life worth living and you're looking at creating change, and that's the willingness to change. How committed are you? Which I think is why I like acceptance, commitment, therapy. You accept different parts of this. You accept your control over things.
You accept your knowledge. You accept many, many things with this. Basically, you look at how your life is oriented. You look at how your life is today, and you actually acknowledge the fact that that's what you've got. And then you commit to taking actionable steps forward and towards these new value-added processes.
So, the willingness to change is where it all begins. If there's something in your life that hasn't changed, is it that you don't have the tools or is it that you're not willing to change it? Now here's the deal. There's nothing wrong with not wanting to change something, but there's more freedom in it that I have found working with clients and acknowledging the fact that you're choosing it. And acknowledging that that thing that's not changing, somewhere you may like it.
Even though it sounds negative, and people talk bad about it, or you judge it as bad and wrong, if you're choosing it, there's a purpose. There's a reason. Now do you have to go down the rabbit hole of the reason. No. But what might be helpful is to actually see where it's working for you.
What is that thing that you're not changing providing? Whether it's a relationship you won't leave or a job that you won't leave or a raise you won't ask for, the working out that you won't do, the bills that you won't pay, the money or the accounting that you won't look at, whatever it is, what is it actually serving? What purpose does it have? And the reason for me that I look at the purpose is because the reality is no amount of tools or advice or processing is going to change it if you're not willing to look at what it's actually giving you. If you enjoy something, you're not going to give it up.
And it sounds counterintuitive to say you're in a bad relationship that you say, oh, you're in a horrible relationship and everything so bad, but you're staying. Is the relationship always bad? Are there parts of it that you like? Is it the way the person talks to you? Is it the way the person, shows up?
Is it how you're intimate? Is it the gifts? Is it actually easy because you're not emotionally close? Is it familiar? So, there's so many layers to this.
And with this willingness to change, the tool that you want to use with it is question. You've got to be willing to ask a question with it and not go to a conclusion. So just say, well, I'm in a bad relationship. There's nothing I like about it. Okay.
If there's really truly nothing that you like about it and it's not serving any purpose, then leave. Now it could be that the purpose is that you have nowhere else to go. Okay. Then it is serving a purpose. It's a place for you to stay.
It's a roof over your head. It's food on the table. It's whatever. The relationship is bad. It's not safe, but it is serving a purpose.
So, to actually break this down and have a look at it and actually acknowledge where you have more control in your life than you think you do and that you have more choices available than you think you do. Now this doesn't mean that when you look at these things and you see the actionable step you could take or the choices that are available that you wake up tomorrow and you do them. Sometimes it's still strategy. Like, the person who wants to have a raise, and they're like, if I don't get the raise, I quit. Maybe not a great place to go if you don't have a backup plan, if you don't have another job that you're looking at.
If you can't get the money at one place, maybe you're applying for other jobs to see if you can get a better offer. Then if you get a better offer, you can always negotiate or leverage that new position, like, hey. If this is what I like to be paid to do this work, if you can't do it, I'm going to go over here and work this job because they're going to give me what I need. There's nothing wrong with change, and there's nothing wrong with your choices. So having a look at this, and this is kind of an introductory into the next few podcast episodes that I'd like to release on this, but having a look at the willingness versus the tools.
Because, again, tools have no effective qualities without a willingness to change. I often will say, if you have a hammer and there's a nail and you want to nail the nail I know nail sounds like a weird word now. But say you want to nail the nail into a piece of wood. You line it all up. You have the hammer in your hand.
You have all the tools. Does the nail go in the wood? No. It doesn't go into the wood until you add some change. You have to move the hammer.
You have to put some energy into it. You got to put some force behind it. Otherwise, you know, you can even move with the hammer and barely touch the nail, and it doesn't go anywhere, or you can put some force behind it. And so that's what we're looking at with this willingness to change and looking at committing to these actionable steps to move forward. And, again, I'm going to do some more podcast on this.
We're going to break it down a bit more, make it more by size. But being willing to actually change this is the first step in in taking those steps forward. So, what is it in your life that you have not been willing to change? And you can make a list of this. And if you want to get really technical, you can do it in different areas.
What have I not been willing to change in relationships? And relationships include all relationships. Romantic, family, professional, religious. So, what have I not been willing to change in relationships? What have I not been willing to change in my business?
What have I not been willing to change with my money flows? What have I not been willing to change with my body? What have I not been willing to change with myself and my image, my personality? Like, whatever it is. Make a list of those things.
And then go through that list and have a look at, okay, here's this thing that I haven't been willing to change. What purpose does that thing that you won't change serve? And the thing that it does could be considered positive or negative. It doesn't really matter but just have a look. So, if you're not willing to change your job you hate your job and you're not willing to change it.
Okay. Great. What is it that you're not willing to change? So, for me, I was looking at body, changing my body, changing my weight, changing my diet, exercising, whatever. I was looking at it with a friend, and then there were a couple of days where my gut wasn't so great.
And I was really looking at it, and then I got a headache, and then I had a pain, and then my back hurt. And I kept looking at where I would often say, oh, I want to go work out and do x, y, and z, but it's not easy because I weigh too much. Or I'd like to go do this exercise or workout, but my back hurts. And so, I started to look at where I'm not willing to have pain or discomfort. So, I'm unwilling to change parts of my body because I'm unwilling to actually have some pain or discomfort in my body.
I like to avoid those things. So, what does that mean? When my back hurts, I'm not moving as much because my back hurts. And if I move more, it might hurt. You see there's question in here.
Right? You hear all the questions? No. No questions. All conclusions.
So that's not to say that if you have an injury, you should work out either. But for me, I know what my back pain comes from. I know the causes. I know I'm taking per like, the proper treatment, you know, chiropractic and massage and stretching and doing whatever. And I also know that the thing that I'm avoiding by keeping the pain, losing weight, for example, would help to stop the pain.
The more weight that I lose, the more stretching that I do, yes, it hurts. But the more that I do it, the more flexibility I'm gaining, the more move movement mobility that I gain, the easier it is to do those things, and the pain will subside eventually as I strengthen the muscles. But right now, I'm avoiding strengthening the muscle because I don't want the pain. So, you see the catch 22 here. Note on either side of that, I've given myself 0 choices, and I still have asked 0 questions.
So, I was looking at it the other day for me, and I said, okay. I don't like pain and discomfort, so I won't do these things. So now the next step for me was to say, okay. I'm done doing that. It's okay to be uncomfortable.
It's okay for things to hurt. If I would like to ask my body to change and I would like to change my body, I might have to be a little uncomfortable and have some of these weird feelings or these weird gut things or this weird food thing because when you change your body and you change your diet, things move. And that's how your body moves things. It it's energy. It's all energy.
So having a look at this even for me with money, so this last year and not doing very many podcasts and different things, but the thing that I've really worked on for myself this year was my money. Paying off my credit cards, clearing out my debts, making more revenue, you know, from beginning to end of the year change. Now my debts are not gone, but I have significantly increased revenue and significantly decreased debt. And I have actions, plans, and I've made monthly commitments, and I've paid off 4 or 5 credit cards. And the way that I've done that is if there was an inkling in my world that said, go pay this, and I ignored it, but then it came back up, go pay this, go pay this, go pay this, I would look at my accounts and go, okay.
Could I do this right now? What's stopping me from doing it right now? Okay. This dot that dot. Yada yada yada.
Okay. Great. Is any of it relevant? No. I want to pay it off.
Okay. Cool. All the energy, go make a payment. And in doing that, I have increased my revenue and, again, decreased debt. And so, looking at it in your life, the things that you want to change, again, sometimes the willingness to change it comes first.
It's being willing. There's a couple of willingnesses here. The willingness to change, being willing to fail, being willing to see your flaws, being willing to see your judgments, being willing to have a different point of view of the situation. So, I guess a better way of looking at this podcast is willingness. Just willingness.
What are you willing to be, do, have, create, and generate in your life? Is there anything that you are not willing to be, do, have, create, or generate in your life? And if there's anything that you're not willing to be, do, have, create, or generate, what is underneath that? Unpack it. Have a look at the exercise again.
Write down what you're not willing to change. Write down what purpose this quote negative thing that you want to change or say you want to change is adding to your life, is even the negative things in our life add something. This is where we catch ourselves in polarity. Right or wrong, good or bad, all experiences add something to our life, and all experiences provide an awareness if we're willing to come out of judgment and have a look and reflect on what is actually taking place. So, without making this podcast incredibly obnoxiously long, again, I'm going to do some more podcast on some topics here if it's something that's of interest.
Introducing some of these acceptance and commitment therapy ideas. And if you're someone out there that's interested in it, you can Google acceptance commitment therapy. There are blogs all over that are written for the everyday person. You do not have to be a therapist to understand some of these basic concepts. And the one thing that the next few episodes are going to be about are yearnings.
And these yearnings are the basic principles of what, a substance component therapy looks at as principles that we all we all yearn for, the things that we're all trying to get out of life. And an example would be belonging. You know, so we yearn to belong and to fit in. Another one is coherence, which is that we yearn to understand the world around us. And there's others.
I don't want to get into them here because the more I talk, the less yeah. The more I talk here, the more I'm giving away. And I'd like each of these to be their own individual podcast because there's so much reflection that can happen with each of these individual yearnings. So, all that being said, if you're listening to this episode, willingness. Have a look at the exercise.
Have a look at the change that you'd like to have in the next year. And I know that it's December and, you know, New Year's is coming up. And if you're someone who does New Year's resolutions or changing each year, this might be a great place to start with what is it that you're willing to change and what are you unwilling to change. What are you willing or unable to have? You know, you can change it up a willingness.
What are you willing in your life? What are you unwilling in your life? So, I look forward to recordings more podcast. I'd look forward to hearing from you any feedback that you may have. And if you're listening to this after so many months of not having any episodes out, if you're someone who's listened to all of the previous ones or have been involved, I just want to say thank you for your support and having a listen.
And let's see what else we can talk about and best wishes for you creating a life worth living.