Time For A Change? Reconsider Your Story

Lior Arussy was working with a consulting client recently. Out of nowhere, the woman, with whom Arussy had been having a very congenial series of exchanges, responded to something he wrote in a way that was very aggressive and, he says, “quite surprising.”

“I picked up the phone,” says Arussy. “I said, ‘Let’s talk about what exactly happened.’ And it happened to be that that specific executive was bullied by several people before, and therefore she was looking at everything through the lens of, ‘here’s another bully coming’ because a word that I said sounded similar to somebody else who tried to bully her in the past.”

For him, it was just more confirmation of what decades of work helping companies with transformation had taught him about the psychology of change and resilience: that we are, at the end of the day, the product and, too often, the prisoner of our stories. The ones we tell ourselves about the world and other people and the ones we tell ourselves about ourselves.

Arussy says changing anything—whether a company or yourself—requires deliberately revisiting and “authoring” those stories, not only revealing engrained habits of thinking but, more important, shifting perspective to the strength and “superpowers” we gain from key episodes in our lives.

How to do exactly that is the subject of Arussy’s latest book, Dare to Author! Take Charge of the Narrative of Your Life (Greenleaf, 2024). Part behavioral psychology text, part introspective memoir, part workbook, Arussy’s Dare dives into a practical structure for changing yourself or your organization through the detailed examination of the stories we tell about ourselves.

Let’s Write

“When I’m talking about authoring,” says Arussy, “I’m talking about a process that actually converts life experiences into future strength and development. My argument in the book is that oftentimes, especially with activities or occurrences that happen to us without us planning, we are living them as a scar, as opposed to as something that can help us develop in the future. But life is a series of unprecedented events that, if we learn how to author them from the experience we had and into future tools and strength, we can develop the resilience to grow faster and better.” In a recent interview with Chief Executive, he offered three simple ways to begin:

Write a Chapter. In the book, Arussy suggests as a starter exercise writing “a chapter” about how you responded to a huge crisis (he had one client facing a major challenge look back at their response to the 2008 financial crisis, for instance, to help them see how resilient they had been and could be again). Answering a series of prompts that will guide you through your recollections of Covid-19 as if telling your grandchildren about it is a great way to begin, he says. (See “Author Your Covid Chapter,” p. 10.)

Watch Your Words. Another way to get started is to begin tracking the words you use—and becoming more mindful about what they are telling you about your narrative about yourself and the world. Do you use words like bottom-line, outcome or failure? You may be signaling you’re mostly results-oriented. How about felt, devastated, frustrated, love? Your orientation may be more emotional. Words like standards, excellent and exceeding expectations are signs that your narration is demanding and uncompromising.

Get “Smart in Hindsight.” Revisit something that happened 90 or 180 days ago with prompt questions such as: In the context of time, how did your story evolve? What happened after and as a result? How did your emotions change? Did the outcome of the chapter drive you to do something you didn’t expect?

“In this context, the chapter emerges stronger, more insightful,” writes Arussy. “Most importantly, you will become wiser and prouder as a result (yes, in hindsight). There is nothing more powerful than reflecting on and discovering that what seemed to have been a failure became a powerful driver for a better life.”

Finally, says Arussy, you should share what you’ve “authored” if you really want to lock in a change. “If you leave it as a thought to yourself, then it’s not going to help you much,” he says. “But now, you’re starting to create a social environment that will learn from your stories, hopefully will get inspired, but also will be able to remind you. The sharing part is starting to help us institutionalize that personality by sharing it with others.”

Exercise: Author Your Covid Chapter

To understand the power of authoring, Arussy suggests writing responses to a series of guided prompts related to your experience of Covid-19. Why Covid? “It’s not threatening because it happened to everyone,” he says. “We have a bit of a distance. And I’m asking you to simply answer questions and try to see what emerges from your answers.”

1: The unexpected is emerging. Many of us saw what was happening as a remote story, something evolving elsewhere. Even as it did come closer, “it will not happen to me” affected many. As you heard about Covid-19 starting to spread from China to the world in early January 2020, where were you? What did you think about the threat? What was your initial reaction? Did you take any action?

2: It’s hitting home. You then heard about a person you know who was in a hospital or even died from the virus. Now it felt like this was no longer a problem far away. It was here. Yet, medical experts had no real way of treating it. How did you feel at this point? As you saw authorities struggle and realized there was no magic cure, how did it affect your confidence? What fears or anxieties did you experience? How did you cope with the fear and anxiety?

3: Stuck at home. For the first time in most of our lives, we heard about government mandates to stay at home. We were required to avoid human contact. We washed our hands constantly. How did it make you feel? Whose hug did you miss most? What place were you eager to go but couldn’t? What methods did you find to connect with loved ones? What Netflix shows did you binge on? What home redecorating did you do during that time?

4: Must do something. You were working via Zoom and couldn’t see your colleagues in person. Staying at home was taking a toll and became more painful. You were anxious to act.

What toll did this new situation take? What did you do? Who did you help? What fears did you overcome? How did you overcome them?

5: Emerging a hero. Somewhere during the process, you started to refuse to be a victim. You started to discover new capabilities. You decided to take on a new hobby—learning how to cook, mastering a new craft or learning a new language. What did you do?

What was the moment when you said enough is enough? When was the point you decided to stop being a victim? What power did you discover?

6: My special superpower. As you emerge from the passive nature of a victim and try to act, you discover your superpower. What is your superpower? How did you feel discovering it? How did others respond to it? What impact did you have on others when you used your superpower? How did you enhance and perfect your superpower?

7: Lesson and growth. As your superpower activated and you were no longer a victim, you converted helplessness into empowerment. A passive story became a milestone in your life, a story to tell. What did you learn about yourself? How would you use these lessons to overcome fears in the future? What growth did you experience? How did it affect you in the long run? Did you make some life-altering decisions?

8: Validation. For all of us, crisis is a test of our values. We may claim we are someone, but until this value is tested in real life, it is merely an intention. Only a true test can validate if we are the people of values we claim to be. What values of yours did you live during the pandemic? Which values did you manage to live by? How would you react differently if it happened again tomorrow?