Why Most People Never Change For the Better

We all change. Everything changes. Change is the one thing that doesn’t ever change. Change is happening to us and all around us all the time. We can’t stop it. We only have two choices.
 
Do we want to change by improving in an upward trajectory of getting better and better?
 
Or do we want to do nothing to improve, which will lead us into a spiral of deterioration, degeneration, and decay?
 
Those are our only two choices in life. There is no such thing as staying in one place, standing still, or staying the same. That isn’t possible.
 
The irony here is that we all know this. We all know we need to improve by….guess what? We need to improve by actually making changes that improve us. Knowing that we need to do it isn’t enough.
 
We also all already know what we need to do to change for the better. We all know we should be eating healthy, exercise, spending less time consuming mindless content, spending more time creating and engaging, and spending more time out in nature.
 
There is no secret to health, longevity, and ongoing vitality and improvement. It never was a secret.
We already have these instincts built into our guts, our hearts, and our intuition.
 
No one has to tell us what’s good for us because we all already feel this at a visceral gut level. Our bodies constantly send us signals all day every day to let us know how our bodies are responding to the way we’re treating ourselves, either for good or bad.
 
So why do the vast majority of people never change and always keep repeating the same old bad habits? Why are the vast majority of people trapped in this cycle of self-destruction even when they know it’s destroying them?
 
Most of them will tell you straight out if you only ask them. Most of the time, they’ll give you some variation on the same theme: “This is just the way I am.”
 
Some people say, “I’ve been doing this all my life and I’m too old to change it now.”
 
Or they’ll say, “I enjoy it,” or “We’re here for a good time, not a long time,” or something to that effect.
 
All of these catch-phrases mean the same thing and they all point to the root of the problem.
 
In order to change our behavior, habits, or lifestyle, we would actually have to change who we fundamentally are as people.
 
If I’m in the habit of sitting on the couch watching movies and eating junk food, I would have to completely change my whole personality profile if I suddenly became a hard-working regular gym-goer. I would have to commit countless hours a week to preparing weighed, healthy, macro-calculated meals for myself to make sure I got the right nutrition.
 
If I’m a broke high school dropout working at a fast-food drive-through window, I would have to completely re-build my entire identity, values, and belief system if I wanted to become a highly driven, ambitious, tenacious entrepreneur. I would have to build one or more side hustles that demanded all my time, effort, attention, and maybe even multiple years of further education.
 
If I’m hopelessly, nihilistically depressed and I don’t care who I hurt or how, I would have to take a massive and terrifying deep dive into uncharted spiritual dimensions to get in touch with the heart and soul of what is really going to make my life and interpersonal relationships mean something.
 
This is why the vast majority of people never change anything. They don’t want to change who they fundamentally are—and that’s exactly what they would have to do to make any of these changes for the better.
 
Think about it. Think about anyone you know or even someone you may only have heard about on TV or on the internet. We’ve all seen the before-and-after progress pictures of people who have lost huge amounts of weight and now are in the best physical shape of their lives.
 
We’ve heard the stories of people who were homeless and living on the street, turned their lives around, worked hard, and became millionaires without any help from anyone.
 
We’ve heard the stories of alcoholic, drug-addicted, abusive spouses and parents who were destroying their own lives and the lives of their loved ones and children—only to find God, turn their lives around, and fully embrace the path of goodness, redemption, and helping others.
 
What do all these people have in common? What do these people’s friends and loved ones say about every single one of these people?
 
The friends, loved ones, and colleagues all say, “He’s a completely different person now.” These people say, “She isn’t even the same person anymore.”
 
And they’re right. Even the person who changes says that. That is exactly what happens when we make one of these changes for the better. We grow and evolve into a different person—a person with different beliefs, priorities, values, spirituality, work ethic, and standards.
 
These are exactly the things people are the most unwilling to change. These are the things that are required to change in order for the person to change at all.
 
This is what people mean when they say, “This is just the way I am.” The person isn’t willing to change their beliefs, priorities, values, spirituality, work ethic, and standards. The person would rather die than change any of those things. The person would rather not change at all than change for the better.
 
Probably most of you reading this right now already know there’s some area of your life where you could and should improve. We all have them. Most of us have more than one.
 
We won’t even be able to start the process of making these changes until we’re at least willing to change the underlying identity structures that make these behaviors possible. These identity structures are the first building blocks of the new habit we want to implement.
 
We won’t be able to stick with an exercise and nutrition program until we start seeing ourselves as the hard-working, consistent gym-goer, runner, or weightlifter we hope to become.
 
We won’t be able to change much of anything until we start committing hours of our time each week toward our target, whatever it is. We’ll have to commit that time upfront—before we start to see results.
 
We’ll have to commit a whole crap ton of time we formerly wasted on frivolous distractions, entertainment, mindless scrolling, or other self-destructive habits like drinking to excess after work and on the weekends.
 
Just that one small aspect of the process—the time commitment—requires a massive change in thinking and identity alignment. We won’t get past the first block if we can’t do that much.
 
Most people aren’t willing to do this. Most people are far too committed to being the person they are now. They never envision or take the first steps toward building the person they’ll be on the other side of that long, hard trek to the other side of their goal.
 
It’s never enough to change a habit. Some people say the best way to change a habit is to replace it with another habit, but that’s only half the story. It’s more like five percent of the story or maybe even less.
 
The rest of the work happens between your ears, in your heart, and in your very soul. You have to completely reorient yourself to yourself, reframe your self-concept of who you are, what you stand for to the rest of the world, and what you’re willing to do to embody that reality so everyone else can see it, too.
 
You have to become the person who is consistently hard-working and ruthlessly committed to accomplishing your goals and tasks. You have to become the person who doesn’t settle for anything less than your best from yourself.
 
This is how you become that person—not by doing the habits. You actually have to transform yourself into the person who consistently does the tasks. The tasks don’t change you. You do that to yourself. Then you do the habits because you are now the person who does those things.
 
If you aren’t willing to do that, you won’t even make it out of the starting gate. You’ll find a way to fail and stay exactly where you are—which is the same thing as going backward into oblivion.
 
So if you really want to change something in your life, start by changing yourself first. Start by asking yourself the question, “Who are you really? What do you stand for?”
 
That’s what change is. If this is just the way you are, then this is all you’ll ever be—until you start to crumble and fall apart. Chances are you already are crumbling and falling apart. You either already know this in your heart or you’re working overtime to deny it to yourself. There are no other possibilities.
_____________
All content on the Crimes Against Fiction Blog is © Theo Mann. You are free to distribute and repost this work on condition that you credit the original author.