Change. Always happening, yet always difficult to master. We are all always changing, and yet, not always in the ways that we want. =)

Can change be mastered? Can we choose how we want to change and actually do it? Can it be achieved joyfully?These are some questions that I ask, as I scratch my head into premature baldness.

Behind the scenes of change

As a medical student and doctor, almost every person who I’ve met has needed some form of lifestyle change – healthier eating habits, more physical activity, better stress management, deaddiction – the list goes on…. my medical textbooks have told me that I must impress upon my patients about the absolute need to change such behaviours. Very clever!

Yet somehow they missed out the part about how I could actually bring about the change. Most people are already aware of the need to change. And a majority of them have tried to bring about change. Many times! Ask a smoker, or an overweight person if they have not tried to make effort to change. At your own risk =)

I began to research and study change and on the way I have come across some very powerful ideas on the subject. But very few ideas match the simplicity and the elegance of the stages of change model – the result of some very interesting work by Dr James Prochaska and his colleagues.

I will put the model In a nutshell in the next paragraph. Before that let me say why I believe this is a work of genius.

Coming to the model, Prochaska’s research led him to see that change is a process. We all know that, but he was also able to break the process into distinct stages and demonstrated relationships between the stages that can be used to predict the change process. Now, that’s something most people don’t know!

Let’s take my own example to understand these stages. I have a difficult time maintaining healthy eating habits and I tend to eat really, and I mean really, unhealthy food, and quite a lot of it, when I’m feeling upset. Don’t tell anyone. I’m a doctor.

Stage 1 – Denial. I don’t even acknowledge the need to change. Prochaska calls this stage Precontemplation.

Stage 2 - My mom has politely said that I’m looking healthy and my brother has poked me in the gut and gone off into a fit of laughter. There’s a crack in my thick skull. “Hmm..maybe I need to change something?”, I am thinking. This stage is called Contemplation.

Stage 3 - More serious thinking. I almost mean business here! I thinking of all the stuff I need to cut out of my diet and all the green and orange and yellow stuff that I’m going to add in. I’m thinking of all the restaurants that I need to keep away from. You get the picture. This stage is called Preparation.

Notice how the stages are named so appropriately? The simplicity just blows me away!

Stage 4 – Action! Now’s the time I put all my preparation into play. Walk the talk, put the sprouts where the mouth is, and all that.

Stage 5 – 6 months of continuous Action gets me to Maintainence. In my experience the first two weeks are easy. Now the red meat is beginning to look really, really good. And I’d ready to exchange a couple of organs – one liver and one pancreas for six of those hot wings anyone?

Stage 6 - Termination – that’s when I’ve completely kicked the habit. I’ve mastered change and I’m the king of the world.

Last but not the least is the Devil himself, Relapse. No matter what stage of change I’m in, relapse can spoil the party, strip me to my skin and take my efforts straight to hell.

So those are the stages. And as you’re reading them I’m sure that you were able to see how you’ve experience them in your life already for a variety of changes that you’ve tried to implement.

The stages seem easy enough to understand, but let that not fool you into underestimating the efficacy of the model. The magic is in the details, the application. How can these stages help me change? How can I use these stages to help others change? And the most important question of all if you are in the work of helping others change – how can this model be integrated to your existing methods and increase your efficiency? There’s a lot to be said and that’s what the ‘New Post’ button is for.

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Wishing you Lightness

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