Psychologist says

Many people complain that it's hard to achieve growth and change, but do you know what's so hard? It's not the lack of a good and effective approach, it's the need for a specific goal, or sometimes just a specific action.

If you have ever observed a group led by Irving Aron, you will be amazed at how the leader in a group needs to take every opportunity to help the member find a specific goal for change.

For example, a woman in her late seventies came to Aron's group and began by saying, "I don't think I belong here, my husband has left me for three years and I have been thinking about ending my life for three years, we are very close and I don't want to live alone in this world ...... "Aaron's whole body leaned forward, bowed, and listened carefully to every word she said, and when she finished, Aaron spoke: "Do you see this is good? You try to stay here for 10 minutes, you can help me observe what everyone in this group is doing, and then you can decide whether to leave here."

After 10 minutes had passed, Aron turned his attention to her and asked kindly, "How do you feel?" The lady thought for a moment and said, "I think I can try and see if I can stay here." The group was 90 minutes long, and when the group was ending, the woman said, "I think I'll be here on time next time."

That may not seem like much to many people, but for an elderly woman who lost her loved one and had been thinking about ending her life for three years, it was a weighty change.

The loss of her lover brought her endless pain, and it wasn't just that she felt she didn't belong to the group, but that she felt she didn't belong to the world. When she is willing to try to stay in the group, it means that she is willing to try to find the meaning of life again. Rather than asking the woman what was going on and why she felt she didn't belong, Aron was helping her to find a specific goal, or a specific action, as specific as trying to stay in the group for 10 minutes, or as specific as just helping the leader to observe the group.

If a person is ready to change, he or she will not just look for a direction to work on at the macro level, will not just set an ambitious goal for himself or herself, but will make a significant attempt at the micro level.

One of my clients wanted to overcome his depression and return to work as soon as possible, but he was frustrated by the difficulty he had in getting up every morning to brush his teeth and wash his face.

Before giving him the intervention, I affirmed, "You know, for many depressed people, getting up in the morning is difficult, if not impossible, can you tell me how you manage to get up early every morning?"

He told me how he overcame his laziness and got up on time in the morning, I took advantage of the situation and continued to ask: "Look, in the past, you were also reluctant to get up in the morning, and at that time you also thought of many ways, but they were not effective until you were willing to get up yourself, you could get up early, and you kept going." He nodded: "That's right." I continued, "Is it possible that you wash your face and brush your teeth just like getting up, and you can't do it now because you're not willing to do it?" He listened and asked curiously, "Why?" I shrugged: "I'm not sure why you are, anyway I know myself, once I get up in the morning and wash my face and brush my teeth, then I have to go out to work." He nodded vigorously, "Yes, I still don't want to go to work." I followed up with, "It's okay, you must be willing to do something else, you can try it, ask yourself if you can do something in the morning when you get up?" He thought about it for a while and told me that he would think about things like things that had happened in the past when he was in school, like when he broke up with his girlfriend. I invited him to write down as much as he could about what he was thinking about, and then we would discuss it together in counseling.

The counseling went forward little by little, at first, each step was slow and even a little difficult, but each step was solid. Slowly, he could walk straight into the bathroom in the morning to brush his teeth and wash his face after getting up and writing, and after a while, he could go for a walk. ...... The counseling lasted for most of the year, and he finally achieved his goal and returned to work. You may think that this is too long, but don't forget that before that he had been unable to work and live normally for almost three years.

If you want to change yourself, you have to look at the big picture and start small. If you can see a specific goal and accomplish a specific action, you need to change. The value of counseling is to help the client to understand himself again, to see what he has done, and to work with him to find a specific goal or a specific action for his change.

It is too easy to ignore the efforts we have made in our lives, to overlook specific actions or specific goals. If growth and change are always hard for you, try to see if you can find a small, concrete goal and try to do something concrete first.