To Change Yourself

Written by Phyllis Brandano

I read an article by Robert Golding about change. One of the best lines he wrote was, “I try not to trip over the same stone.”

That statement struck a chord. Some people talk about changing but don’t actually do it. Others try changing but when it becomes difficult, they revert to old patterns.

His advice gave me hope. As long as we don’t ‘trip over the same stone’ or keep making the same mistakes in the same way, we are moving forward. By adjusting our actions, our patterns and ingrained personality traits that prevent us from being happy, we are trying to improve as human beings and that’s hopeful.

In my case, the stone I needed to avoid was control. During my childhood years, my house was often in chaos. My parents grew up during the depression so work became important but that meant the children had to help. After school, I was given a list of tasks to complete to help keep the house running smoothly but that somehow had to be managed around the unstable machinations of an older sibling before bipolar disorder was on the radar.

The phrase ‘I’m dancing as fast as I can’ summarized my formative years. No matter how many times she caused a conflict, I tried to find a way to control it. I became peacemaker when my mother and father couldn’t figure out what was wrong .

These early experiences set the wheels in motion for learning how to manage uncontrollable and highly emotional events. I repeatedly practiced being in ‘control’.

When I became a teacher, the pattern for control was built in. Students needed to be ‘managed’ so the work could be accomplished and even though I adopted a style of caring and creativity, classroom control was how I was evaluated by supervisors so it stayed in the forefront of my mind. For over twenty-seven years, I perfected techniques that assisted me in keeping things ‘under control’.

When I became an administrator, the control pattern took on epic proportions. I was now in a position of juggling multiple classrooms, teachers, parents and central office staff over an eight year period and foolishly believed I was managing quite well. School business was proceeding. There were some problems as with any large organization but overall, I was satisfied with my managing skills. Eventually, I retired but still held firm on my impression of ‘control’.

It wasn’t until I my husband was diagnosed with multiple myeloma that reality came crashing down. No matter how hard I tried keeping a schedule, preparing medications and arranging for services, my efforts did nothing to prevent him from contracting hydrocephalus which made him totally dependent on me. He could not use the bathroom, dress himself or walk without help. For months, I was his twenty-four hour caretaker. The saddest part was since mental acuity is also a profound part of the disease, I was virtually alone.

As I struggled to keep a firm grasp on what was happening around me, the devastation gave way to clarity. After all the years of trying to manage everything, I had to honestly laugh. Things fall apart whether you manage them or not because in reality…

We can’t control life.

Things happen to us, good and bad and we can’t do anything about it. The only true control we have is how we manage ourselves. We can waste energy getting angry, being afraid or crawling in a hole but the difficulty is going to happen so you might as well figure out the best way to handle it.

So now my ‘control’ is just for me. If I need to shed a few tears, I do. If watching an old movie with a cat purring beside me helps, I give into that while focusing on my breathing and staying in the moment. No matter what, this too shall pass and if I could go back and tell my younger self to ‘let it go’, I would. For now, I just keep repeating, “Are you tripping over the same stone?”