How Do We Accept What Is Not in Our Control?

Senior Behaviour Specialist Tanya Curtis explains that one of the first lessons she had to learn in her work was that she cannot change or control another person’s behaviour; she can only change or control her own. And thus, in the dustbin went all her pictures and expectations that she was there to change other people’s behaviour.

So if the answer is no, we can’t change or control a situation, her suggestion is that we don’t put any effort into it. We don’t give it any focus but choose to spend our time on things within our control – and that is our own behaviour.

There is much in our past that we can’t change, but some people spend hours, weeks, years and even lifetimes regretting their past movements. Why? Because it stops us from focussing on our responsibility to learn to do life differently at present and into the future.

So when life brings a so-called challenging situation, we can try to control and change it, which we know is impossible to do and therefore sets us up for guaranteed anxiety and fear. Instead, we can bring focus to our own behaviour, to how we approach life, to our own livingness and ask what’s there for us to look at and learn so that the focus is on responding to this life situation rather than react and try to change or control it.

Can we change anything that has occurred in our life up until this point? Absolutely not. So, no need to focus on it. Just simply focus on the lessons at hand and ask how to do life differently when this same lesson is re-presented again and again.