THE SCHOOL OF LIFE VIDEO SERIES: Be the Change You Want to See

We so often complain that others around us aren’t changing in this way or that. But one of the best ways of encouraging them to change is to change ourselves, something we’re often surprisingly reluctant to do.

We spend a lot of time trying to change other people. There is, after all, so much wrong with them: they’re selfish, arrogant, bullying, weak, cold, needy and so on.

So we try to point this out – and often meet with resistance, denial or sheer indifference. This can be very agitating and hence renders us cross and severe. Why won’t people take our lessons on board?

In our behavior, we tend to be making an implicit distinction between two projects: getting other people to change – and changing ourselves. We know we may have to develop in certain ways, but for now, our focus is on altering others. We make an evolution in our own behavior conditional on evolutions in other people’s. We vow that we’ll be nicer if they’re nicer, that we’ll be less strident if they give up shouting.

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