I want change. NOW!

Sometimes things have crept into your life that you don’t like so much: habits, depression, or something else that holds you back. We often see that in an initial conversation, people hope for a kind of miracle. As if their life will change completely right after a single conversation. Or that they will be “done” after a few sessions and able to move on.

When that quick change doesn’t happen, people sometimes get angry with themselves. “I’m done with this, I should be able to do this by now.” But that thought doesn’t help.

We sometimes compare it to an oil tanker on the ocean. You don’t just change the course of such a ship overnight. It takes time to get that enormous mass moving and slowly steer it in a new direction. You can pull hard on the rudder, but the tanker needs space and time to respond.

You can stomp your feet as much as you want or shout all you like, but true course correction requires a lot of water to be displaced first.

In short: don’t get angry with yourself if change takes time. Perhaps even more time than you had hoped. The course that was once formed wasn’t created in a single day either. Therefore, you won’t change it in a single day either.

Grant yourself that time. Being angry mostly costs energy and yields very little. You can put that energy to much better use by sailing a new, healthier course step by step.