I’m facilitating a course right now that asks for a lot of change from participants. Changes in daily routines, which have already been upended by work-at-home, school-at-home, loss of work, ailing selves, ailing family and so much more. Yet still, these people signed up for even more change. Reading, Writing, and Exercises designed to encourage change in how they think about themselves. Heavy stuff, but with the huge payoff of being more creative in their lives.

It’s important to remember that even good change is stressful. Stress causes all sorts of physical and mental shifts designed to protect us, that are often unpleasant. Too much stress can lead to feeling overwhelmed. Overwhelm can trigger a fight or flight response that’s pure adrenaline and shutdown, all at the same time. Decisions become monumentally hard. Prioritizing can seem impossible. So how do you introduce change in a way that’s going to nurture your growing creativity? Can you do it so it doesn’t make you more stressed? The first couple of weeks of The Artist’s Way can feel exhilarating to some, and extremely difficult for others, as you change what you do and why you do it.  

For any major change, or complex, stressful project, for that matter, these three steps will set you up for success:

1. Pause and Notice

2. Picture your Past Successes

3. Plan your Approach

Let’s break these down:  

Pause and Notice

Do something you know will ground you - a walk, meditation, a few deep breaths, patting your dog, a few rows of knitting, getting a screwdriver and tightening some wonky things you’ve been ignoring for 5 minutes. Whatever gets you out of your head and lets you just be. Let your blood pressure drop and get some perspective. Give yourself some space to think. You need to get clarity. Only then can you start to tackle the stressor.

Picture your Past Successes

This isn’t your first kick at the can.  You’ve pulled off complex change before - think of all the change you went through to make it to adulthood.  What has worked for you? Picturing in detail what success will look like is motivating. You can start by remembering what success has looked like in the past, then how you got there. What did it feel like when you were doing a challenging task? Can you remember what time felt like? Was the sun shining on you or were you working by moonlight? Is music playing, or is the TV creating white noise in the background? Noticing what creates the circumstances for good work can help you recreate those circumstances.

Remember the feeling you had when you achieved what you’d set out to do. Sit with it a bit and know that you’ll have that feeling of accomplishment again soon. Leverage that success mindset to move onto the next step.

Plan Your Approach

Now that you can see yourself enjoying the results of making this change, think back to how you made changes in the past. What worked for you? How can you replicate that? Did you ease into change the way I used to enter a pool, one step at a time, or do you just dive in? I now dunk myself up to my shoulders and consider it a bold act. I also do that with changes I need to make. I don’t tell myself that this is IT, everything is going to be Different from now on, it’s a New V!  That’s never been successful for me, but it might be for you. I add and subtract things that help or hinder my progress, based on what’s worked in the past. There’s no one perfect path for everyone, but if you look for patterns, it’s easier to see through the trees.

If you don’t have a challenge right now but want to build your resilience muscles, notice next time you get info flow. Make some notes about the experience. You’re looking for things you can add to your toolkit the next time you have a complex project or need to make a change that will ultimately be rewarding, but may not feel like it as you do it.