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We have it all backward. We lament how the world is falling apart because other people won’t change their pernicious ways. Health-care costs are soaring because other people eat too much and exercise too little. The workplace is too political because others hoard information and resources. Others have dangerous political or religious views. Others are polluting the planet. And worst of all, "others" come to a full stop before entering the new traffic circles in my town. Sheesh.
That’s why we all crave the ability to influence others. If only we could get them to change, our lives would be much better.
But over the past few years, I’ve gained an appreciation for a distinguishing capacity of some of the greatest people I know—the capacity to influence one’s self. Unlike most of us, these individuals are capable of thinking of themselves as influence projects. They can stand above themselves like interested scientists and consider the habits and proclivities of their favorite lab rats—themselves. By doing so, these select few develop insights, interventions, and strategies to get themselves to behave differently.
I started noticing this tendency four years ago when my colleagues and I began a study of changers—people who took on monumental personal challenges and succeeded. I studied the change strategies of people who overcame decades-long addictions, people who changed themselves in order to correct dysfunctional relationships with loved ones, and people with profound work-limiting habits who owned up to their deficiencies, reshaped their habits, and relaunched their careers.
But it wasn’t until a year or so into this project that we discovered the most important lesson: If you’re thoughtful and clever, you can trick yourself into behaving in ways you otherwise wouldn’t. We began noticing changers’ internal dialogue and how often they referred to themselves almost in the third person. They thought about themselves in an objective, detached way that was odd. "I can’t believe I did X" one might say—as though talking about a total stranger. Or "I better be careful or I’ll do Y." Or even better, "If I do X, it will make me do Y." Most important, we realized their bizarre conversations with themselves, about themselves, weren’t just incidental to their success; they were fundamental.
This one-person dialogue enabled changers to take on two roles in their change process. Somewhere along the way they realized they had to become not just a subject, but also a scientist. To mimic their success, do two things:
1. Take charge. Stop playing a passive role in your change process, looking around for some smart person to write a book, invent a gadget, or offer a seminar that will fix you. No one knows how to do that because you’re unique and no one has ever studied you.
2. Study your behavior. As a scientist, you need to gain far more insight into what conditions make you behave in different ways. You must appreciate the many sources of influence that shape your choices. Successful changers see themselves as lab rats running through life’s maze and conclude the only way to really take control of their behavior is to take control of the maze itself.
While I admire and love many of the changers we studied, one has become an overwhelming favorite of late. Her name is Margaret Maxfield. She exemplifies what it means to think intentionally and carefully about influencing yourself. I believe Margaret’s intensely personal change challenge is a textbook study in using science to influence your own behavior—and ultimately your happiness. Let me start by sharing a bit about her to illustrate my thesis.
Margaret was born in 1926 and her husband, John, in 1927. Two years ago, 5-ft., 3-in. Margaret realized it was increasingly difficult to keep her 6-ft., 6-in. husband from falling, or to help him back up when he did. So they came to the difficult conclusion that they needed to move to an assisted living center.
