- Mary Shelley in Frankenstein
Change is stressful. All change. Even good changes are stressful. Knowing why the brain reacts to change the way it does won't prevent it from being stressful, but it might help you deal with it.
A few years ago, Dr. Deborah Gilboa said this at a Learning and the Brain conference. - "Your brain has many functions but one job, to keep you alive. Whatever difficulties you may be going through, you are alive. Any change, no matter how good, might change that. So you could be ecstatically happy about a marriage proposal, and your brain will respond with, 'Cool, but could you die, though?' That is why change is stressful." Your brain prefers to keep things the same as much as possible.
And yet, that's not how life works. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus is credited with the idea that the only constant in life is change. You change as you learn; so do others. Friends get married and have children, changing both their lives and yours. Students graduate, and co-workers leave the company. Bosses change, and inflation happens. You get the idea.
So, if the reason for the stress is that your brain is trying to maintain your current state of "aliveness," it makes sense to trick your brain into thinking of changes as smaller than they are. No matter how irrational it sounds, in terms of your brain, the bigger the change, the more significant the chance of death. The reason most New Year's Resolutions fail (aside from them being stupid, as I've discussed before on this blog) is that we set goals requiring huge and immediate change. In the misguided belief that dropping a ball in Times Square will renew us overnight, we suddenly take our calorie intake from Christmas level to third-world level; and our brain freaks out. The popularity and success of smoking cessation helpers like nicotine gum and patches show that stopping cold turkey is expecting too much change too fast.
Small changes are more doable because they scare your brain less. A smaller change might carry a smaller risk of death with it, so your brain doesn't cause you to fear it as much. Adding a nutritious item to each day or removing one serving of junk food won't make your brain think you are experiencing a famine, making you crave every calorie you see. That change is sustainable, so it will soon stop feeling like change. If you have decided you spend too much time on social, your brain will accept it more if you go down by 15 minutes every day this week and then 15 minutes again every day next week than it will if you go down by 30 minutes overnight. The less "change-y" it feels, the less anxious your brain will be. Unless your bad habit is immediately dangerous, stepping down is better than a sudden stop.
I teach a study skills class, and two weeks ago, we talked about the organization of study materials and environments. Some of them are natural organizers and others are a hot mess. I told those who were a hot mess that I wasn't asking them to become like "the color-coded matching folder" people; I was just asking them increase by one level - perhaps one folder for things to hand in tomorrow. This is a small change that can last the rest of the school semester. Perhaps, then, you can step it up one more level in the future.
Some things, of course, cannot be done in steps. If you are moving from one house to another, having a baby, or leaving a job, you cannot really do that in small doses. In those times, it would be most helpful to remind yourself of the things that are not changing, no matter how small or to focus on the ways in which that change will improve your life (to remind your brain that you aren't likely to die).
Change is inevitable, but you can, as the great Daniel Willingham put it, "Outsmart Your Brain." So, be realistic in your goal setting, and give your brain time to adjust and remind it that some changes are good.
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