Ultimate Self (realizing personal potential)

Will they change?

They cheat on you, or constantly lie to you. Or they borrow money and never repay it, betray your confidences, or drink, gamble, take drugs or mistreat you. You are fed up and threaten to end the friendship or relationship. They promise it will never happen again. They promise they will change.

You are attracted to them but they have characteristics you don’t like or that disturb you. But you are sure you can change them. If you love them enough, if you can get them to love you enough, everything will be fine. Surely true love will fix their violent temper, addiction, or irresponsibility?

Their behaviour is making you miserable. Things are going from bad to worse but you are sure they will change once—you are married, once you move in together, when they become a parent, when they give up alcohol/drugs/gambling/their no-good friends, when you move somewhere new, when they get a job, get a better job, when they ‘grow up’, or when any of the other things that bad behaviour can be blamed on changes.

But how likely is it that people who behave in ways that are frustrating or damaging to others will change? Not very.

Our personality characteristics or traits dictate the way we respond to the world. And our personality is pretty much ‘set’ by the time we are adults. By definition our personality is made up of distinctive thoughts, emotions and behaviours that are enduring and unchanging over time and in different circumstances. For example if you are outgoing you were probably outgoing last year and will be next year. Once developed, the core elements of our personalities do not change quickly or easily. The majority of people sent to prison for example have been inmates before. Even incarceration and the loss of freedom cannot change their criminal tendencies. People do what they do because it comes naturally to them - it’s who they are.

Focus for a moment on one of your innate traits and then deliberately try to change it—if you are talkative for example try remaining silent, and if you are quiet try being a chatterbox. If you are honest try telling deliberate lies, if you are neat try being messy and if messy try being neat. You might manage such radical changes for a short time but lasting change is not so easy, is it?

There is an old story from the American South-West.

A coyote was loping along a riverbank one hot afternoon when he came across a scorpion who pleaded with the coyote to carry him across the river. The scorpion had been on a tree leaf and a gust of wind had blown the leaf and the scorpion across the river and far from his home.

But the coyote knew the scorpion was deadly and so refused. The scorpion reasoned with the coyote. ‘I would never sting you’, he promised, ‘I have great need of your help. There is no other way for me to get back home so it would be foolish of me to hurt you. Just let me climb on your head while you swim across the river’.

The coyote saw the scorpion’s logic and believed his promise so agreed to carry him across the river. All went well until they approached the opposite riverbank when the coyote felt a piercing sting in his head. ‘Oh,’ he cried in pain, ‘you have stung me and now we will both die. Why have you done such a terrible and stupid thing?’ he asked.

‘I can’t help myself,’ replied the scorpion, ‘it’s just my nature.’

The best indication of future behaviour is past behaviour. Does that mean that no one can ever change? Of course not. But change requires insight, genuine commitment and determination and constant, consistent effort. The truth is that most people don’t really want to change and if they do, they don’t know what to do to bring change about.

So what do you do when someone who has caused you distress or harm promises they will change? Perhaps they deserve a second chance (or perhaps not?) but never give them a third chance.

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