Can You Really Change?  Can Anyone?

The Teapot Incident

The day I discovered people can change I was at the university health center set to have a session with my very first couple clients on my own. Mr. and Mrs. T. had sought my services because they were distressed and needed guidance. I was supposed to sit down across from them and present myself as an ‘expert’ in personal change. I didn’t feel like much of an expert.

For starters, I have to say I didn’t much believe people could change. I’d been to SeaWorld so I believed porpoises could be taught to jump through flaming rings and could thus change ‘what came naturally.’ But people? If people could change, why would anyone be overweight or bite off their fingernails?

I hadn’t been able to change my own self-defeating habits. For example, I frequently drew back from meeting new people in group situations– even though over the course of hundreds of such encounters I always ended up glad I decided to participate. Anytime I entered a new group, my anxious emotional storyteller would convince me to hold back with the lame rationalization that I had nothing in common with others in the group. 

If a person could truly change self-defeating behavior, why did I still go through the ‘nothing in common drama’ with every new group situation?

Needless to say as I seated my clients, I was thinking that this situation wasn’t going to work because I had nothing in common with this couple. I was also thinking that Mr. and Mrs. T. could see right through me for the charlatan I knew myself to be. To make me even more inept appearing I was young, blond, and short. I could not recall one word from my studies and training. I was quite sure this husband and wife two decades older than me would take one look and walk out.My hands shook so badly I flipped the pencil across the room trying to sign them in. My hands felt huge and clumsy. This was back when smoking was legal. Oh, how I envied the smokers and the men with beards. Those lucky interns had something to do with their hands. If you took in a puff or stroked your beard while you stared off into space, people assumed you were thinking deeply.

Taking up smoking didn’t seem like a sensible trade-off so I decided to make myself a cup of tea as a prop. I offered tea to Mr. and Mrs. T. but they declined. I quickly retreated to the tiny break room next door to the therapy office. The dividing ‘door’ was only a set of louvered panels so that I still had to watch making noises or saying anything while I prepared my tea.

Here’s when ‘it’ happened. When I learned for myself that when a human is given sufficient reason—she can change behavior she was absolutely convinced was ‘automatic’ and not within personal control.

I removed the whistling teapot from the stove top and brought it across the room to the sink where my cup plus teabag waited. I tipped the pot with a jerk (Did I mention I was a little tense?) and boiling water roiled out and over my hand like clear lava. My throat closed off. Blisters and welts formed immediately. I could not bear the pain. I could not.

But I did. This is the spot where in my life before I would have screamed and screamed. But I didn’t. I didn’t utter a word. Not even a squeak. I’m not the silent suffering type—not that anyone would be in the circumstances. Had I been at home, or heck at the theater, I’m quite sure I’d have screamed, then cursed verses to make my riding coaches proud.

Once I’d made a scene, I would have said “I’m so sorry, but I couldn’t help it. Just look at my hand!”

I would have believed my screams and curses were indeed reactions I ‘could not help’ and anyone around would agree that my reaction to pouring boiling water over my hand was indeed out of my control. Automatic. Not my fault.

And because the behavior was ‘not my fault’ I had no power to change it. Not good. Also not true.

What I’d just discovered was big. I’d learned that humans have more power than I ever would have believed possible. My desperate need to appear professional had overcome what I’d considered automatic behavior.

I now knew that people could change. Maybe there was something to this psychology gig.

I ran cold water over my hand and entered the therapy room with a smile. Since my right hand was burned, I did what anyone would do in the situation. I pretended I was left-handed.