Change is in the Air – How to Cope

I should mention, as a matter of perspective, that change is always in the air. Life never remains static. The questions to ask about change are - how big is the change and how much will it affect you and the things you care about. For example, the introduction of web technology caused massive changes for some and relatively minor changes for others. If you were the owner of a local independent bookstore, a journalist, or in one of the many professions that were profoundly altered by the web, then the changes to your life were pretty massive. However, if you were someone who used to order products from a catalog and just started ordering them on the web instead, the changes were not that great. For any change, there are those who will see it as "everything changed" and others who will see it as "just a different way of doing what you always have done before".

Massive changes can affect your identity as well as your profession. For example, if you were a steel working when the steel industry evaporated, it was not only a professional dislocation but a loss of identity.  Even if you managed to land a new job, with good prospects, the way you viewed your self in the steel industry was probably very different from the way you see yourself trying to climb the corporate ladder. So even if you managed to recover financially, creating a new identity would still be a challenge.

Let us assume, for the sake of this post, that you are one of those whose life will change significantly. What can yo do to  ? It is, as they say, easier said than done. But, the first step is to avoid denial. If things around you are changing in significant ways, you have two choices: accept that things are changing, or deny the change and put your fate in the turbulent forces of the change. Most people would say that avoiding denial and accepting the change is the way to go. But, most people actually do the opposite. One of my favorite pundits, Gerald Weinberg, once said something to the effect that people will only change to keep something bigger from changing. I think there is a lot of wisdom in that. Since one's identify and profession are pretty big things, they are only likely to change them to keep something bigger from changing like their livelihood and their ability to survive.

Once you have accepted that change is occurring the next step is to adapt. This is a challenge because you are replacing the familiar with the unfamiliar, the predictable with the unpredictable, and security with risk. Still, you need to find a way to incorporate the change into your life. And here is a tip that might help. If you had to move to a new city for some reason you would experience many of the same things. But, you wouldn't stay locked up in your apartment. You would go out and find where the shops are. You would find what attractions the new city offered. You would find out how the transportation system worked, what local customs were and so on. Initially, it would all be strange. But eventually, it would become familiar. When change comes don't stay locked up in the past. Get out and find out what is going on. Initially, it will be strange. But eventually it will become familiar.

Refine, Test, Refine More. Test More

A pattern is a much less rigorous form of a scientific theory. That is to say that the pattern is extracted from experience in an attempt to explain it economically. And the pattern, like a theory, must be hardened through testing. So, if you find a useful pattern you must test it in two ways. First, you must make sure that it does, indeed, explain the phenomenon. Second, you must use the pattern to predict future events and see if it holds up under that requirement. Supposing that it does, you must keep looking for ways to refute your pattern. Over time, if you cannot refute the pattern then it is probably a pretty good pattern. And if you do manage to refute, you might try refining it. However, as you attempt to refute your theory, you must be aware of some troublesome cognitive biases. That is we are inclined to accept evidence that supports our theory or pattern while dismissing data which refutes it. We want our pattern to be correct. But, in order to make it correct, we have to view it critically, rejecting aspects of it that don't fit and continuing to challenge the parts that seem to fit. Over time, if you objectively challenge the pattern, you will strengthen it and increase its utility.

How to Get a Clue or How Can You Get Better at Recognizing Patterns?

If you follow the stock market, you might notice that when stock prices go up too fast or go up for an extended period of time there is a good chance they will tumble back down at bit. The tumble may be minor or significant. But, we can see a pattern here which we will call "What goes up, must come down".

This pattern does not just apply to stocks. We can see a very similar pattern in the careers of celebrities and politicians - riding high one day and in free fall the next. It also happens with hit music, fashions and fads. It might even happen in your love life or your job. It is a useful pattern that we see in many very diverse situations.

The "What goes up, must come down" pattern is simplistic but it is a place to start. Once we recognize this pattern we can refine our understanding of the phenomenon which the pattern describes. We can ask questions like - do difference situations have a different pattern in their rise and fall. Do some things go up fast and fall just as quickly while others grind up slowly and go down like a beach ball filled with water? Are there elements of situations that give us a clue regarding which rise and fall pattern they might fit? Once we have one pattern, no matter how simple it may be, we can expand it into a whole family of other patterns.

Are there different patterns that describe the same situation? For example, we just used the "What goes up, must go down" pattern to describe your love life. Maybe other patterns will do just as well. Let's say we have a pattern of "Initial euphoria, disillusionment, accepting reality" which also applies to your love life. Perhaps this pattern could apply to corporate mergers, or peace treaties.

The point here is that the more patterns you can recognize the more situations you can apply them in and the more nuanced your understanding of phenomena can become. So, start looking for patterns and when you find one try applying it to other situations. And begin creating more nuanced patterns for specific situations. Over time you will develop a collection of patterns that you can apply to a variety of situations. But that, it only the beginning.