Change Happiness Curve: how emotions drive success

Changes can be both emotionally draining and intensely exciting. Our resilience and determination ride on the rollercoaster of the change happiness curve. Discover the emotional dimension of the change and become more persistent on your journey to your goals. Overcome your own change resistance and prepare in advance for when you lose the motivation. This change management secret works for personal transformations and individual challenges, when starting your own business as a freelancer, to grow your small business, or when pursuing a new career.

Accomplishing your goals and resolutions can elevate your life, career or business. You not only achieved your desires, but the victory is a wonderful self-confidence booster too! But the journey is not always roses and butterflies, right? There are tough times, discomfort, doubts, confusion, even regrets. And it’s when our mood is down, that 53% people quit their change ambitions.

But if you understand the secrets of the change happiness curve, you become resilient to temporary lows and persistent on your journey to accomplish your plans. Let’s find out what is the the change happiness curve and how it works for you — or against you.

Most people think about the change execution as of a sequence of actions we take — and once you do everything right, you get your result. But what makes the change tough is actually not that much the sequence of the tasks or actions.

It’s how we feel — and what we feel — when working on them. Because that’s one of the biggest reasons why we either succeed or fail to accomplish what we had started.

According to one study, we can relate 53% of abandoned personal changes and resolutions to subjective and emotional factors. People usually describe them as losing the motivation or as changing their mind. But when we dig behind these generic statements, we find out that we give up because we feel frustrated, unhappy, inferior — generally, not successful.

And I can tell you that this is perfectly normal. This is how all the difficult and substantial changes look and feel. The important changes take some time. And over the time, our mood and spirit change and fluctuate along the change journey.

We may call these fluctuations the “change happiness curve”.

So how does it look like, how does it affects us and how shall we work with it?

The Change Happiness Curve

The change happiness curve describes how your mood and perceived happiness evolve over time, when you carry out any substantial change activity. And it doesn’t matter if it’s in your personal life, in your job or entrepreneurship. Also, the change happiness curve applies not only to us as individuals — but relates to teams and organizations as well.

The change happiness curve looks like a distorted sine wave (sinusoid) and has three distinctive phases.

At the beginning, the curve goes up, into the positive numbers. That is when we set up for the change. We are always full of energy and enthusiasm at the beginning, right? You have just made up your mind for the next adventure. You are ready to go and in your mind you see the bright and shiny images of how great the future will look like.

And there’s nothing wrong with these feelings. This is all very natural and welcome. The initial change optimism is great because it set you on the starting line, it gives that momentum you need so much.

The first step, the first decision is usually the hardest. To take the active action and not to capitulate to the circumstances. That needs some courage. And the change happiness curve gives you that uplift. The extra push, the extra energy and mood boost. So cherish the initial surge of endorphins, happiness and positive mood. Let it ride you over the doubts and your natural change resistance.

Let it supercharge you for the next phase of the change happiness curve.

The first bumps

Because in the second phase, the change happiness sine wave takes a swing down. The curve gradually falls into the negative zone.

That’s when you start to face the first challenges and problems on your change journey. You realize that not everything is so bright and shiny as you have imagined. And not only you have to deal with boring and stressful problems. Likely, you also notice that you are not progressing fast enough — or not at all. You feel that you are stalling, trampling on the spot.

And it even gets worse when you start comparing yourself to your peers or to all those success stories from social media or Forbes magazine. Everybody seems to be doing so much better than you. They all give the impression of achieving their wins effortlessly, by a flick of the wrist.

This is the time when your mood and self-confidence drop down, sinking like a wrecked ship. You may even become irritable, moody. You start to doubt, to question yourself. You question the very goal of your change activity, your very objective.

And this is very normal. That doesn’t mean a thing. But unfortunately, it is this phase when most people quit. They are so overwhelmed by the negative thoughts and feelings that they loose their motivation to continue. And they give up.

So how do you overcome this dark valley? How do you cut through the clouds of doubt, through the haze of hesitation?

Firstly, by understanding that what you experience, what you feel, is just a normal phase on the change happiness curve. That’s what it is. Nothing more, nothing less. And it has nothing to do with your skills, with your performance — and it certainly doesn’t mean you are not a good enough person. It’s just a natural reaction of our brain when we do not get an instant gratification.

Secondly, you overcome this curve drop by simply keep going. Yes, I know how it sounds. How the hell should you do that when down and blue, right? The detailed explanation of the change management toolbox would be beyond the scope of this very episode. And for sure I will address this topic in some future episodes of this podcast.

For now, you should understand that you cannot rely on sheer willpower nor motivation. I always say that they suck when it comes to accomplishing a change. And it is this phase of the change happiness curve when they evaporate.

Instead, focus on the purpose of your change. On the mission. That stays put, that doesn’t go anywhere, whether you are happy or sad. That’s why it is so important to be clear on what is your strong personal reason for the change you want to achieve.

Because when you keep going, despite all the hardships and feeling sorry for yourself, the chances are that the things will eventually turn out for the better. And so does the change happiness curve.

The sweet uptake

The third phase brings the change happiness curve upwards, back to the positive zone.

And here, the magic happens. Because as you overcame the difficulties and as you resolved the problems, you actually start to see the real tangible benefits of your change activity or project.

Now you see your muscles grow or your desired body shape to form.

Now you see your business take off and get the traction, with orders picking up and cash-flow improving.

But not only that. Now you are also feeling very well inside. You are proud on what you have achieved. And your self-confidence boosts. The endorphins are back, your mood is bright again — you feel happy and rewarded. You did, right? This is time to celebrate.

The Conclusion

The change happiness curve is a natural cycle that accompanies any kind of change. And depending on the complexity or duration of your change project, you may experience one or several swings of the curve. But now, you have the understanding and you can prepare yourself.

Obviously, there is no need to worry about those high mood / high energy phases. The trouble with change execution are those downward, negative swings. But that’s what they are — just temporary and fairly natural periods. Don’t let them stop you. Don’t let them weaken you. Don’t let them make you quit.

Rather embrace these moments, because it’s actually a sign that you are on the change journey. That you are out of your comfort zone. And keep going. Because eventually, you will cut through the problems. And you know what? When the change happiness curve swings up, it pretty always jumps much higher than it ever was. And that feeling is priceless.