Be on the Lookout! 3 Tips for Changing Well

Aside from spectacular “Aha!” moments or epiphanies, people who accomplish change in their lives actively LOOK for 3 things regularly:

• Look for their own mistakes and shortcomings
• Look for patterns in their life experiences
• Look for the good in themselves and others

This might sound simple, and for a day or so it may be, but to truly let these three become a lifestyle takes effort and is where the rewards of change are found. We live in an ego-driven culture with an economy based on making sure we “look good”. In some families, friendships, and work environments the unspoken advice is “don’t look vulnerable, don’t make mistakes, and don’t admit to being wrong”.

In these sad pockets of society, where many of us have spent at least a portion of our precious life, being wrong is often responded to with shame and blame. As a result, too many people will spend their days avoiding making mistakes- or the detection of their mistakes. This is very, very unfortunate. Noticing our mistakes is the great opportunity of life. Only what I can (and will) see can ever be changed. No one ever gets it right all the time. Being wrong is inevitable. Admitting our errors, and bravely taking chances, is where we begin to improve.

In 1923, when Babe Ruth became the “Home Run King”, he held three records in the league: highest batting average, most home runs in a season, and the highest number of strikeouts. He hit a lot- and he missed a lot! He would not have gotten his great honor without also risking that infernal strikeout statistic that no player wants!

In college I was introduced to a book about analyzing errors as a method for teaching mathematics better by finding out the specific portion of a math procedure a student didn’t understand. This analysis let the teacher focus follow up lessons to better re-teach what wasn’t understood the first time. A huge life light bulb went off in my head that day!

I’d spent my life hiding my mistakes as an abysmal math student. The error analysis method indicated that hiding my errors had slowed down my progress even more. I immediately realized this concept had broader applications in life than simply improving math scores. Many years later, as the founder of an alternative school, I brought these techniques to our math program, our writing lessons, and our Being 101 class, where we learned social skills for emotional well-being.

In that school, in order to create a climate of trust where we’d be safe to acknowledge our mistakes, we had to lay down new ground rules in our classrooms. Together the adults and youth reworked our habits to reduce the shame and blame we were all used to dishing out in traditional settings, with the goal of eliminating it entirely. When one or another resorted to shame or blame, we’d acknowledge it, apologize and then try again with a healthier way of phrasing. It was common to hear the encouragement “No shame, no blame, just problem-solving” chanted here and there throughout the day. We were teaching ourselves how to communicate better with one another and teaching our hearts to become brave enough to admit our problems as a first step to solving them.

In those classrooms we proved the truth of the old saying “admitting you have a problem is the first step of the solution”. Once we will admit our errors on a regular basis, we can begin the advanced work of looking for our life patterns more fluidly.

It is advanced work because it usual takes a bit of dedication to be an emotional detective. With practice we begin to notice the themes that seem to run through our lives. For one it may be abandonment, for another betrayal, for another it might be a great gain followed by an equalizing great loss. These patterns may not entirely be random. Sometimes an early difficulty or trauma gets trapped inside of us and our subconscious makes choices ever afterward to recreate variations of the original trauma. This may be our psyche’s way of giving us “batting practice” so we can improve our life swing or it may be that as humans we’d rather stay with a familiar difficulty than try better path that is foreign to us.

Either way, once you see the patterns you can begin to legitimately alter your way of thinking/acting to not just avoid similar difficulties, but to truly root out the mindset that sets the stage for the repetitive drama. It isn’t easy work, and certainly isn’t always pleasant to view what must be bravely encountered, but it sets us free to make meaningful changes that last.

Along the way, as we look for our errors and patterns, we must wisely infuse ourselves with hope. Looking for the good in ourselves and others gives us a steady dose of encouragement and trains our mind to expect that good is coming. In a portion of my life I am a photographer and my relationship with my camera makes a great illustration of looking for the good. The difference between a mundane picture and an excellent shot can often be accomplished by simply stepping to the right or left, or tilting the camera a few inches up or down. I once captured an excellent shot by lying down on my belly in the MOMA sculpture garden to position the small Giacometti statue directly in front of a sunlit skyscraper as I pointed my camera upward. The “shot” could only be witnessed from this angle. Since I was on the hunt for good images, I found the necessary angle and created a memorable scene.

As the artist of my own existence, I decide what I point my lens toward and what I frame within the viewfinder. We do this with our minds also, and the more selective we learn to be, the more wondrous our life view becomes. What we let our mind feast on creates our mindset. We can train ourselves to look for the good in all experiences and people every day. This is work worth doing.

Though growing older is unavoidable, growing up and growing wiser are not guaranteed. Maturity and wisdom are reserved as a prize for people who can- and will- do these three valuable things with their attention:

Look for our mistakes and shortcomings

Look for patterns in our life experiences

Look for the good in our self and others

L O O K