As 2018 slowly comes to a close, I felt motivated to write something that would reflect a little on the year that was for me, however more importantly on a bigger scale about peoples ability to adapt to change.
This past year, saw a few milestone changes, nothing overly dramatic mind you, no loss of a family member or close friend, no job change, I didn't retire, suffer any illness or purchase a new house. Some examples of what for most people might constitute change. Some of those have occurred at various times over the course of my life, some have been positive and some not. Let me start by saying that I consider myself fortunate and have a good and even great life. I have been married for 27 years ( yes with the same woman) and met her 32 years ago. I have a job I enjoy even those like any job it can be stressful at times and certainly frustrating on occasion, I am a homeowner with no mortgage, in good health and how only only lost a few family members ( an aunt 35 + years ago, both grandmothers and my mother in law in 2016). I never knew my grandfathers since one passed away before my birth and the second left my grandmother and lost touch with his family also before my birth. I have had good life, filled with ups and downs like anyone but overall, a good life. So 2018 had one big, impactful change for me. As anyone who read the blog regularly or follows me on twitter knows, I retired from coaching. In the biog scheme of life it is isn't life altering but it was significant since for 27 years, coaching was a big part of my life, a constant that defined much of my personality and value system. There were a few minor changes, I am now wearing a beard for the first time ever and purchased an SVU as part of a more active lifestyle my wife and I are trying to enjoy, however these two might be as much symbols of my adapting to life without coaching, a new look and attitude as much as they are actual changes. Truth be told, since the winter, I had started to hear the little voice inside me that maybe it was time to stop coaching. Don't get me wrong, I still loved it, I enjoyed the rush of sport, of being on the field leading practice and certainly game day, but the time commitment and energy required were starting to take their toll. Rather than looking forward to plan the next season, I was looking for reasons to continue coaching. For 27 years, basically the entirety of my married life, I have spent coaching almost year round, Certainly for the years with the Quebec teams and at university, it could represent as many as 900 to 1000 hours yearly. so basically the equivalent of 50% of a regular job, on top of my regular job. So for the first fall in 17 years, I found myself with lots of free time and I told myself from the outset that I would not replace the hours spent at coaching just sitting around the house doing nothing and thinking about what I didn't have any more. I used the extra free time to explore new activities, get things done around the house and most importantly, thank my wife for the years she had spent picking up the slack while I was away on a field somewhere. I told her to find an activity she might have wanted to do in past autumns but maybe felt she didn't have the time for and to do ahead and try. That I would take care of things at home, it became ONE way of adapting to my new found time. So this leads my into the meat of today's blog post, dealing with change. There are two sayings, "change is constant" and "change is a constant". "Change is constant" means that change is occurring continuously, while "change is a constant" means that change is an always-to-be-expected condition. While the two might seem on the face of it very similar, the choice between the two terms thus depends on context and what you want to emphasize. Things change constantly. Loved ones die; jobs end, as do relationships. People get promoted, couples bond in marriage, and babies are born. Guess what? The positive changes can be as hard to adapt to as the negative ones. Here are some tips on adjusting to change, both good and bad, to help make life easier. When a good change appears, accept it with grace. You may not believe you deserve it, or you just may not be ready for it, but the only way to move forward and get the most out of it is to embrace the positivity, however it shows up. When a negative change is looming, start looking for alternatives before it actually happens, if you can. For example, if you know your company is in trouble and you are hearing things that are making you insecure, don’t wait to get laid off, but start looking for another job. Even if your current position isn’t changed, you will have gained valuable experience and maybe a better gig. Change is constant, so we usually don’t notice the little or the expected changes; it’s when you are caught off-guard that you can get discombobulated. The trick is to know that it is just one of the millions of changes that are going to happen in your life and, good or not so good, do what you can to just roll with it. Emotional changes can be the hardest to adjust to. For example, when your heart gets broken, acceptance is not always an easy option. You may not have the strength or understanding to be objective. In cases like this, you need to process your feelings, and this can take some time. If you want it to go faster, see a therapist. When you start to develop feelings for another human being, it is as though everything changes. Generally, people who are falling in love see life differently, and it’s real easy to get caught up in the feelings and ignore whatever else is going on. Take care of the day-to-day, and enjoy your sweetheart. I am a big believer in taking ownership and accountability for owns actions and lot on life. Some of the best moments in my life have been when I've make a conscious decisions to accept that certain are my own and not blame them on parents, work colleagues, the faceless "other". This is a bog component of being able to adapt to change as it happens. Too much time and energy is wasted playing the "why me" game instead of just hunkering down and finding a solution. If the changes in your life are overwhelming, you don’t have to deal with them all by yourself. Friends, family, support groups, and counselors are available, but you do have to reach out and ask, which can be hard. It may be a struggle, but you don’t have to suffer. The love of those who care for you can make life much easier to deal with. If you are someone who hates change, then you are going to have to at least tolerate it when it happens. There is no law saying that you have to like what’s going on, but you do have to find a way to cope, because change happens, like it or not. Life can be difficult to navigate in our fast-moving society. Things are changing so quickly these days that by the time you’ve opened the box of your new cell phone, it’s probably out of date. Learning (at your own pace) to deal with the changes going on around you is a great survival tool. We used to say “Go with the flow,” and that may be the most comfortable way to deal with the future. Yes, people like stability, change can be scary, but life is always changing. An optimistic view is to say that change is progress.
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AuthorAfter many years of coaching at various levels and with different teams, I thought I would share some of my experiences and thoughts about coaching. Archives
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