Losses and Gains through Change

I have often used the following tool when clients are going through, or about to go through, major changes in their lives. Of course, I also find it useful to apply to my own life. A good metaphor to use here is moving to a new house.

Most changes have both losses and gains

As we approach change we may look forward to what we perceive will be gains, especially if it is a change that we desire. However when we first step into the change we may feel overwhelmed with a sense of loss, as loss will be the dominant feeling until we actually begin to experience some of the gains. After we first moved into our newly constructed house I felt lost in the unfamiliar surroundings for a while.

If the change is something that we are not looking forward to, we may be identifying losses and find it difficult to contemplate that there will be any gains as we approach the change.  However once we step into the change some gains will gradually appear. When elderly people need to leave their homes and move into aged care accommodation this is something that they often do not look forward to and the sense of loss in leaving their homes and many possessions behind can be overwhelming (along with the sense of giving up their freedom).

In both cases the gains will probably increase over time and the sense of loss will hopefully become less intense.

A simple tool to use

The diagram below can be used to represent these losses and gains:

However in reality the journey post change may look more like this:

Ways of acknowledging the losses

There are a number of things we can do to acknowledge losses:

• ·         Write them down to identify and externalise them
• ·         Picture them in our minds
• ·         Grieve for them by expressing appropriate emotions
• ·         Identify how we feel about the changes

Identifying gains

It may be useful to ask ourselves the following questions:

• ·         What things do I still have that I had before? (In the case of moving house we usually take familiar possessions with us).
• ·         What things have I gained already?
• ·         What things could I gain in the future?