Time to change the lightbulb

Posted on July 17, 2017 by Cheryl Keates, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.

So – when do you change a light bulb? Maybe you change the bulb when your carefully written note says, “It’s almost time to change the bulb.” Maybe you change it at the first flicker. Sometimes you wait until the light kind of flashes on and off, intermittently.

If you’re really resistant to changing the darn bulb, you wait until you have to squint to see. If you’re hard-core, you wait until the room goes completely dark. And then there’s that special group, small but real, who says, “Aah, who needs to see, anyway?”

You know who you are. And so do I. Or at least I know someone like you; perhaps, it was me.

Change does not come easy. It’s the most difficult task we ever impose upon ourselves. AND it’s essential. Exciting. Terrifying. Change is everything a life-sustaining achievement should be. Part of us will die if we don’t do it; part of us will die in the doing…but that’s only the old part we no longer want or need. Here’s my new version of an old joke: How many people does it take to change your light bulb? Two – you and me. Your’re ready to do it and I’m here to guide you through.

While some of us are OK living in the dark (we’ve been doing it for years!), most of get to a point where the darkness overcomes us. We’re tired of the shadows, the stress and feelings of being “stuck.” We’re lost in a job we no longer enjoy, even a career we never wanted to pick. We sabotage our relationships but don’t know why. We go through the motions but never move forward. It’s safer pedaling backwards.

I get it. But even if we long for the light, first, we have to make it through the grey area. We must come face-to-face with all the fears and excuses, the rantings and the roadblocks we create to keep us in the dark and avoid committing to change; to, finally, kicking them to the curb and coming into the light.

“Excuses” are easier to recognize and usually ring untrue even to us. They’re things that others will, surely, talk us out of, like: I’m not smart enough to change, old enough, young enough, experienced enough, TALL enough, for goodness sakes. Or all the “I don’t haves:” I don’t have the time to change, the support, the know-how, the perseverance and so on. Excuses are on the surface and fairly easy to brush away. But fears are deeply etched into your experience, a part of your DNA.

Here, fear of failure reigns supreme. This is the fear that makes your stomach churn in the middle of the night. What if you make the change and, then, like a hollow New Year’s resolution, it’s gone in a wink or a week. Your self-esteem, confidence, respect of your friends and loved ones, your colleagues, your hopes for a new beginning and a bright future may all go with it. So why start? Suffering still offers hope; failure is final.

The only thing suffering offers is more suffering; failure leads to more change. I’m here to show you how. Today, there are more tools in the toolbox, more ways to discover your strengths and more strategies for practicing how to use them, successfully, than ever before.

What could feel better than flipping a single switch and turning the light on in your entire world? It’s time to change the bulb!