Immunity To Change
This Is Why Personal Change Is So Difficult
What Is Immunity To Change?
The term "immunity to change" came to prominence in the book: "Immunity to Change. How To Overcome It and Unlock the Potential in Yourself and Your Organization", by Harvard
Graduate School of Education professors Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey [2009], in which they address the issue of why personal change is often so difficult.
Their
proposition is that your failure to achieve a personal change goal isn't a lack of willpower, it is the result of an "emotional
immune system" that helps protect you from the negative impacts of
personal change such as disappointment and shame. In summary:
Your failure to achieve a personal change goal isn’t the result of a lack
of will-power, it’s your "emotional immune system" trying to protect
you.
Immunity To Change & The Hidden Commitment
Immunity to change can be defined as a "hidden commitment", with an underlying root cause, that competes and conflicts with a stated commitment to change.
It these hidden commitments that cause people to not change and to fail to realise their best intentions.
Put simply, it is these hidden commitments that cause us to not keep New Year resolutions, to fail with diets, to not stop smoking etc.
Immunity To Change & The 'Knowing Doing Gap'
Kegan and Lahey refer to a "knowing doing gap", or as Kegan puts it:
"...how to close the gap between our intentions, things we actually want to carry out, and what we are actually able to do".
A dramatic and poignant illustration of the "knowing doing" gap can be seen in research in the US healthcare sector. As Kegan explains:
"If you look at people who are prescribed maintenance medications, people who should take, for example, a statin drug for the rest of their lives to control blood pressure or high cholesterol and stay alive, you would assume 100pc of these people would do so, wouldn’t you?
It turns out that research carried out here in Massachusetts shows that anywhere from between a third to a half of all Americans on maintenance medications, who understand why they’re on them, don’t take them after a year."
Kegan concludes:
"They’re usually around things like 'the incentives weren’t high enough'. Someone tells you you're going to die if you don’t make this change; that’s a pretty high incentive, right?"
The Roots Of Immunity To Change
Put simplistically, we can understand the origin of these hidden commitments from two perspectives:
1. The hardware - the physical structure of your brain or more accurately brains.
This video clip outlines the evolutionary background to your brains:
Professor William Irvine - Evolutionary Psychology - extract from Stoicism & Framing
These
thoughts are non-rational and largely driven by survival instincts and
pleasure instincts - sometimes referred to as our "animal nature".
Many of our negative thoughts stem from these regions of the brain - or brains within our brain.
2. The software - the conditioning from our primary caregivers and dominant adult figures in our childhood that creates the thoughts that give rise to our immunity to change.
This is a vast subject and there are many psychological models and interventions used to address and "repair" this conditioning.
For simplicity, if we use Buddhist terminology there are three concepts to frame this:
Samskaras
- impressions created in our minds and thoughts by our actions or, more
damagingly, the actions of others upon us. If these actions are
repeated regularly, they become a habit and are performed largely
unconsciously. The stronger these habits become - as with all habits -
they exercise increasing power.
Anusaya
- latent tendencies which are these deeply ingrained samskara, or
habits of response and thought, and which are largely unconscious.
Samsara
- the cycle of being caught up in perpetual suffering, death and
rebirth. This is often thought of in relation to reincarnation but in
fact describes the hell on earth - in this life - that we create and
endlessly put ourselves through with our samskara and anusaya - or our
"shadow side".
Think of this as a ferris wheel of suffering.
So with this combination of hardware and software in our brains it is a wonder that we ever get anything done!
The resolution of these problems is to bring this resistance/immunity to change into conscious awareness and to frame our proposed personal change objectives in such a way that all areas of our brain can agree.
How To Resolve Your Immunity To Change
The process is very simple - and very powerful for its simplicity - and is based around a four-column exercise.
(1) Set A Goal You Want To Achieve
Identify the areas in your life where you want to make a positive change.
Underneath, list the actions that will help you achieve your goal.
Resource: Make sure that your goal is aligned with your core desire and your point of focus.
(2) List & Review Your Obstructive Behaviours
Make a list of what you are doing and [more importantly] what you are not doing to support that commitment.
Identify and review your actions and behaviours that are stalling your efforts.
Resource: How to become aware of your negative thoughts
(3) Confront Your Competing Commitment
Review the behaviours you listed in column two and ask yourself:
"How would I feel if I did the opposite?".
Examine the fears you face in pursuing your goal for personal change by outlining key concerns in the box at the top of column three.
Then list what you fear will be compromised.
These things are your competing
commitments and the real reason for your failure to achieve your goals.
Resource: As your review these behaviours - check your body's reaction to your mind - this will always give a truthful reflection of what you truly feel.
(4) Challenge Your Big Assumptions
At the root of every competing commitment is a powerful assumption.
This assumption contains and expresses an unconscious belief that your hold.
It is powerful because it is stopping you achieve your goal.
It is this belief that you need to overcome in order to achieve your goal for personal change and make it a lasting change.
A good way of uncovering what lies behind these beliefs [the emotional logic] is to state and write down a “if ____, then ____”
statement for each
Supporting Resources:
Changing core negative beliefs
How to change the way you think
How to change defeatist self talk
Further Resources:
A Four Step Process For Immunity To Change And Achieving Lasting Change
The Real Reason Why People Won't Change
Immunity to Change Diagnostic Test
Reconsidering The Context Of Personal Change
Adaptive rather than technical challenges
The inherent assumption in most training and work-related attempts at encouraging personal change is that it is skills based, in other words people can be taught to change.
They can be taught, but generally they won't change. They can't change and according to Kegan this is because of their inbuilt and invisible immunity to change. (I prefer to refer to this as resistance.)
Cognitive development
There are many developmental models that attempt to map and model the stages of complexity associated with mental development.
It has been assumed that adults don't change - can't change - beyond early adult-hood, that a level of development is reached and remains static.
Kegan & Lahey challenge this and assert that based on their research, adults are capable of continuing development throughout their lives. They identify three qualitatively different dimensions of mental complexity what they call —the socialised mind, the self-authoring mind, and self-transforming mind, each of which interpret the world in different ways.
To explore this model further and more fully understand the theoretical background, please see the following resources:
- "Immunity to Change. How To Overcome It and Unlock the Potential in Yourself and Your Organization" By Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey
- "Immunity to Change: An Exploration in Self-Awareness" By Scott J. Allen, Ph.D. Assistant Visiting Professor, John Carroll University Download PDF Here
- "Kegan's Constructive Development Theory" By Professor John E Barbuto - video presentation: View Here
- "Immunity to Change: A Report From the Field" By Jonathan Reams Download PDF Here
- "Immunity to Change - How to Release the Potential of Individuals and Organizations"
2 Case Studies - Download PDF Here
A Personal View
I am well aware that there are many models associated with personal change, and specifically models such as CBT, ACT, CFT, DBT, Schema Therapy etc that are particularly effective when applied by clinical psychologists and other specialist in a therapeutic setting.
I also realise that the immunity to change model may not represent the most current leading edge thinking on this subject, but in my view, as a layperson concerned with practical tools and resources that can be understood and applied in a non-therapeutic context, this is a simple powerful tool for understanding and resolving why we so often find it so hard to achieve our goals for personal change.
Further Resources Related To Organisational Change
Resistance to change - how to deal with it
Dealing with resistance to change
Further Resources Related To Personal Change
How to apply the long game approach to your life and sacrifice short term gains for long-term wins:
The Human Brain Did Not Evolve For A Life Of Delayed Gratification
Issues faced in a delayed return environment: the route is often not clearly defined and does not have clear metrics and milestones:
The Challenges Of The Road Less Traveled
Free Download: One Page Summary Sheet With Action Points & Resources
Return To: Managing Personal Change
- What if everything we think…
LATEST ARTICLES
The Balanced Brain - The Ultimate Route To Personal Transformation
How To Experience The Benefits Of A Balanced Brain. Underpinning all of the belief systems and practices that offer routes to personal change, transformation and spiritual growth is the balanced brain…How To Make Better Decisions - By Avoiding The Narrative Trap
To Understand The Truth We Have To See The Whole Picture. One of the best ways to make better decisions is to have a deeper understanding of the many things that might stop that happening. To understa…The Greatest Love - The Most Important Relationship You Will Ever Have
Yet Most Will Never Know It Everyone of us has a place, in our hearts there's a space, that is home to the greatest love of all. This love transcends everything we think we know about the world of for…Everything Is Connected And Why You Don't Feel It
...And Why It Matters
As human beings we are skating on very thin ice with our sense of self and certainty about "how things are" and what we like to think of as reality:
Who Is In Charge Of Your Brain?
How Not To Be Stupid. Who is in charge of your brain? This is not a silly questions. It matters because the outcomes that you experience in your life are determined by how you respond to the events th…How To Be A Winner On A Very Large Scale
The Incredible Benefits Of Selective Attention. This is not a typical article about how to be a winner. We are not going to talk about goal setting, the importance of habits, the power of focus and al…The Metagame Approach To Life
How To Achieve Your Biggest Objectives.
The metagame approach to life is all about winning and achieving your biggest objectives by:
- Understanding the bigger picture
- Being better by doing things d…Shantideva - The Way Of The Bodhisattva
Walking The Path Of Compassion. Shantideva the 8th century Indian Buddhist sage is famous for his treatise "The Way of the Bodhisattva" delivered as an extended teaching to the monks of Nalanda monast…Reframing History - Deconstruction And Discussion Not Destruction
History is always about context, not imposing our own moral values on the past. For those of us fortunate enough to live within western democracies, we are living in an age where a vociferous and into…Tao Te Ching - Connecting To Your True Source Of Power.
How To Be Lived By The Tao. The Tao Te Ching is one of those books that many people read, few understand, and even fewer put into practice. The only way to know the Tao is to experience it, and it is…How Things Really Are - The Inbuilt Design Flaws
Chaos, Disorder And Decay Is The Natural Order Of Things. Nobody has the perfect life. We all struggle and strive to attain health, wealth and personal happiness. Yet these three big areas: our health…Intuition Or Anxiety - Are There Angels Or Devils Crawling Here?
How To Tell The Difference Between Intuition and Anxiety. How do you know whether the voice of your intuition is real or just the product of your inner anxiety? Several months ago I was having a drink…What Is Truth - How To Tell A Partial Truth From The Whole Truth?
How the truth and nothing but the truth is often not the whole truth. My great aunty Flo broke her arm and died. It is true that she broke her arm in 1923. It is also true that she died in 1949. But t…Duality And Life Beyond Your Thinking Mind
Duality and life beyond your thinking mind focuses on the limitations of time, foreground and background, duality and "stuckness". The first aspect of duality and life beyond your thinking mind focuse…The Conscious Mind Is Limited - Be Aware And Be Prepared
Being aware is the first stage of being prepared. The conscious mind is limited in so many ways. There are some who would argue that there is no such thing as conscious thought and that it is represen…Your Inner Map Of Reality - Here's Why You Think The Way You Do
The big picture of how your inner map of reality creates your feelings, thoughts, and behaviours. Your inner map of reality is based on the filters of your own ethnic, national, social, family and rel…The Failure Of Cancel Culture - Suppression Not Engagement
Why we need to wear our beliefs lightly and develop negative capability. Throughout history people have campaigned to fight beliefs, ideologies, and injustices that they perceived to be oppressive, di…4 Big Reasons Why We Get Stuck In Our Attempts At Personal Change
Most People Spend Their Entire Life Imprisoned Within The Confines Of Their Own Thoughts. This first of the 4 big reasons why we get stuck is, in my view, the most important. The "self-help industry…How Do I Change And Why Is It So Hard?
We Would Rather Die Than Change, And We Usually Do In my experience, the vast majority of people who say they want to change don’t change. Most people reading this won’t change because they don’t real…The Illusion Of A Separate Self - Windows 11 With Self Awareness!
Beyond the content of your mind you are so much more than you think you are. When we talk of "myself" this is the conventional way of referring to our self image which is in fact the ego's constructio…Finite And Infinite Games - Dazed, Confused & Ultimately Transcendent
This is not an instruction manual, it is a wake up call!
Over this past week I have read Professor James Carse's highly regarded "Finite And Infinite Games - A Vision Of Life As Play And Possibility"…The Gap And The Gain - How Your Brain Sabotages Your Happiness
How Your Lizard Brain Sabotages Your Happiness We are hardwired to measure our progress in any and all areas of life where we have goals and aspirations. We can't not do it. But what we measure and ho…How To Wake Up - 4 Simple Practices To Help You Wake Up Now
So What Exactly Does It Mean to Wake Up - What Is "Enlightenment"? There is nothing magical, mystical or mysterious about waking up we’re actually having glimpses of enlightenment all the time. Enligh…Situational Communication - Different Strokes For Different Folks
Situational communication is about taking account of 3 often ignored factors about the other person. You are a situational communicator when you recognise that effective communication is not an event…How To Influence Without Authority - 6 Key Tips
The secret to how to influence without authority is that you get what you really want by giving other people what they really want. We live in an interconnected world and knowing how to influence with…Change Questions To Change Your Outcomes
Asking The Right Questions Is Critical For A Successful Change. Every time we initiate a significant change - whether in our personal life or in an organisation - we will most likely over-estimate our…Group Culture - The Invisible Software That Rules Your Life
Group culture is: "How we do things round here". We like to see ourselves as free agents making our own choices and living authentically but the reality is that The Matrix has many layers and we are u…Why Getting From A to B Is Not Aways A Straight Line
In circumstances of significant change, the progress from A to B will not be in a straight line. We run our lives largely on auto-pilot. In most circumstances your experience of getting from A to B is…The Art Of Persuasion Planning For Success - Here's How To Do It!
To be successful in the art of persuasion you must ensure that certain things happen. To be successful in the art of persuasion you must establish a framework of what has to happen to get you to that…The Art Of Persuasion Advanced Communication Skills - Gaining Buyin
Create The Environment Where They Want To Buyin to Your Proposal In order to build the win-win you have to uncover what it is that the other person really wants or needs, and to do that you have to as…