Clients often come to me for help when they feel stuck or cannot get past an obstacle that they have in their career or in their lives. In most situations what I uncover—with the client, often right in the session—is that they are stuck in a paradigm that they cannot get past and are often unable to extricate themselves from their situation by embracing a new mindset. Going from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset requires first an awareness of its existence. It then requires also the ability and openness to find ways to re-program your brain (your mind, really) to deal with the new reality.

Although I see this in my everyday work when I help clients overcome their resistance to change by providing a variety of tools that are appropriate to their specific needs for a change, what drove this point home in a dramatic way for me was when I watched this video of a person trying to ride a bike that is “rigged” to trick your brain. A “slight” change in the way its mechanism operated made it impossible for this person, well versed in riding ordinary bikes, to ride this one. You can see this is in the embedded video:

https://youtu.be/MFzDaBzBlL0

How does this apply to our everyday experiences? It applies in a consistent way when we are dealing with change. A typical change curve goes through a setback that results in a person’s inability to continue after the onset of change in the same way as they did, before the change initiated. If the person accepts this and stays with the program then they go through the Deny, Deal, Develop, Deliver cycle, where each step successively brings them closer to the end stage of success, when the change is complete and they are able to deliver a positive outcome based on that change.

The Denial stage is when your mind thinks that the change is an illusion and that it will go away by ignoring it. If you persists and fight that urge to quit and stay with the program then you enter the Deal stage, where you develop coping mechanisms to overcome the negative forces that fight the change. In this zone you are still fighting the negative forces and you perform below your optimal level, but moving up in performance towards an acceptable level. During the Develop stage you create your own strategies that equip you to fight the still lingering negative forces until you finally overcome them when you reach the Delivery stage. This end stage often results in a better overall state after the change is complete than before the change was initiated.

This change curve—the Deny, Deal, Develop, Deliver cycle—is apparent in how this person required some eight months to re-learn how to ride the trick bike. In the first attempts his brain was in in Denial over how the steering worked, but then he retrained his brain to accept the new way and he was able to master it in due time. As the video shows children are much more resilient to making a change that adults are.

So, if you have embarked on a new path that requires you to change your old habits use this video as a vivid example and as a metaphor to teach your brain (and mind) how it must deal with the process of change.

Good luck!