Part 2

5. Insertion of Energy

In talking of the need for energy to power up people, systems and resources for change, Don Beck (2009) is reflecting what Fritz & Laura Perls (1951) identified in the Gestalt Cycle, in that attention to difference Mobilises Energy to create the Excitement necessary to power people - either as individuals or as an organisation - into the Action necessary to bring about change.

Certainly huge amounts of energy are necessary to break out into 2nd Order Revolution.

6. Mapping Change: from What to What?

In her speech to the Democratic Party National Convention in July 1992 Congresswoman Barbara Jordan raised the big question: “Change: from what to what?”  Don Beck caught this and has used it since to query those who are perhaps too enthusiastic for change, not being exactly sure of either the present state or the desired state. In a sense, the 6th factor is a corollary to the 2nd. But it is particularly important who those who are supporting and facilitating change, whether an an individual or organisational level.

Present State-Desired State Planning - as described in Strategic Planning - can prove an invaluable tool for those facilitating change.

7. Leverage Tipping

What are the defining moments, the leverage points that finally make change inevitable? They will be different for different people in different contexts - but, once the point is passed, change of some kind is inevitable. The 7th factor relates to the 3rd. How bad does the dissonance have before it can no longer be sustained and the person or persons submit to the inevitability of change...? All too often people recognise intellectually the need for change but cannot get to grips with it emotionally until the dissonance reaches the tipping point.

(My case study, ‘Susan’, tells the story of a lady who came to me for therapy but who took several months to build up enough dissonance to reach a tipping point for change.)

8. Removal of Barriers to Change

Of course, knowing what to do and actually being able to do it, bring us to the second of Perls’ sticking points on the Gestalt Cycle. If you know what to do but you can’t do it …what sort of stress can that create? Perhaps even a return to the Gamma Trap!

So it may be that to effect the change, you need to acquire resources or new skills and/or knowledge – or you need the help of others. Alternatively, getting rid of barriers may mean physically removing them - like a smoker, who has decided to give up, throwing away their remaining cigarettes. So it may be that you need more insight into how to get these things to facilitate the change to be made - and/or you need to decide which things - sometimes which people! - need to be removed from your life.

9. Consolidation

A much parroted saying is: “Old habits die hard!” – and all too often they do…. While new insights may exist, with the mental capacity and determination to put them into action, old associations will still lurk just below the surface in many cases. These old schemas need to be challenged assertively and either destroyed or changed. It  can be hard work retraining your brain to think in new ways. Fortunately both NLP and CBT offer a number of ways of challenging old ways of thinking. These range from meta-modelling (cognitive dissection of your thinking) to timelining (walking your timeline, restructuring your beliefs as you go) to affirmations (regular and rhythmical talking to yourself in positive terms).

During the consolidation phase, it is critical that you are patient with yourself.. Because you’ve changed at the core, you know that you see yourself differently, with different values and beliefs. Unwelcome thoughts and behaviour from the past are simply left-overs that you need to get rid of.

Of course, temperament is a sub-cognitive factor and temperamental factors in change require some slightly different, Behavioural techniques. Reward yourself well for the thoughts and behaviours you want to have. (Do not punish yourself for slips in thought and/or behaviour – you will undermine your self-efficacy. Besides which, pioneering psychologists from Edward Thorndike (1932) to B F Skinner (1938) to Clare W Graves (1978/2005) were all of the view that punishment is usually ineffective as a stimulus to positive change.)

In the consolidation phase, it is important to take into account other people’s reactions to the changes in you. If those changes are perceived by others to disadvantage them, you may well find new barriers to change being erected. (I remember clearly being so energised by first major exposures to Spiral Dynamics that my enthusiasm for generating new business was simply overwhelming for one of my colleagues who began to delete my e-mails without even opening them!)

Once the change is embedded , then the new thinking and behaviour will be second nature to you and most likely accepted by others.

10. Anticipation of New Problems

As both Perls and Beck & Chris Cowan (1996) state, once the crisis is over, then your system is ready for the next challenge. It’s all too natural, after the trauma of change, to want to enjoy the comfort zone of the New Alpha. However, we must avoid becoming complacent; new problems are always just around the corner. All too often the New Alpha itself is part of the next problem - as the old axiom has it, today’s solutions are tomorrow’s problems!