Strategies Around Control and Influence

We all have a collection of things in our lives that we would like to change. When it comes to change, we often find that it's a lot harder than we expect it to be. Even small things turn out to be much more difficult that we think they should be. The problem comes down to control.

In order to change something to be exactly the way you want it, you need to control it. If you try to change something you have no control over, you will fail. A lot of coaches and consultants will get you to draw diagrams showing the things you control vs the things you don't. The message is that you can change the things you control and can only influence the things you don’t. If you want to change something the way to do that is to expand your sphere of control - try to gain control of the thing you want to change. Unfortunately, 99% of those diagrams are completely wrong. We generally have control over far less than we think we do.