Inflection
Without getting too deep into Calculus (which is Greek on steroids to me), “Inflection” is a change point. It’s when we go from one direction into another.
For example, when we use inflection in our speech, we go from one way of speaking to another.
The piece we rarely focus on is the change point. The change automatically happens without us noticing the specific point at which we changed direction.
We usually find this point when doing some retrospection, but it’s of marginal use then because the change has already taken place.
If we notice the change point in real time, we have a much better chance of choosing whether we want to change or not.
What triggers your change? What takes you from glad to sad or vice-versa? What takes you from “in the pink” to needing a drink?
Begin to notice the triggers and you decrease your chances for getting shot. The triggers precede the change and take us to the point of inflection.
Here’s a simple test. Is there a word or phrase that hooks you every time into a less than resourceful frame of mind? That’s a trigger. But notice that the word or phrase has no power on its own to cause change; it’s the meaning that you’ve attached to it that fuels the change.
You have done some pre-conditioning algebra that X=Y. If X always equals Y, you are at the mercy of a debilitating equation. The inflection point is noticing and acting on your response to X before it becomes Y.
You have to do this more than once to reap the benefits. It takes practice to get unhooked from a trigger. This practice has application well past outgrowing your response to a word or phrase.
What triggers your recurring bad mood, a downward health cycle or a spat with your partner or spouse? You’ll never eliminate the triggers but you can notice them, and you won’t pull them as often if you act at the inflection point.
A good place to start is noticing your speech. One word to be on the lookout for is “Always.” “I always get a cold at the beginning of spring.” “She always makes me mad when she says that.” “I always get irritable just before I have my period.” These are all X=Y statements and left unchecked lead to self fulfilling prophecies.
One great way to outgrow these equations is a phrase I learned from the legendary hypnotist, Dr. Dave Dobson. The phrase is “in the past.”
“In the past, I always got a cold in spring.” “In the past, I got angry when she said that.” “In the past, I got irritable before my period.”
Referencing something as “in the past,” suggests to your mind that it’s not happening now. When the trigger fires, the inflection phrase “in the past” or its second cousin, “up until now,” changes the equation from always being true in the past to one of many possibilities now.
I request that you engage your curiosity and start noticing what triggers your automatic behavior and then apply some “in the past” reflection to the point of inflection.
All the best,
John
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