Take Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life One Scene at a Time

People have given me lots of wonderful feedback about how much my book, Take-Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life...Once Scene at a Time, has helped them.

But not everyone likes to learn by reading. Others simply find learning by listening more convenient.After a number of people encouraged me to make a CD, I enlisted well known Internet talk host Allan Hunkin to co-host a series of podcasts.

The product is my new CD, six podcasts, (over 3 hours of material), that cover the same territory as the book, in a series of easy-to-listen to, conversational interviews.

Do you need to make some personal changes in how you handle your life? If you do, this CD is for you. Learn what successful change is all about and how to make it happen in your life. I teach you:

How to plan for change
How to overcome your own resistances to change
Step-by-step ways to practice thinking and acting differently than you have in the
past
How to stay motivated to keep at it
How to keep fine-tuning your performance
How to deal with people who don't want you to change
How to reward yourself for your efforts
The importance of support from people who do want you to change
Beyond any specific change, how to make take-charge living your entire way of life

On the home page of my website www.take-chargeliving.com, there is a link at the bottom of the page to clips from these podcasts. Please check it out. I'd love to hear what you think.

Why is Marion Kramer Jacobs qualified to help you take charge of your life? For starters, she holds a PhD in psychology and is an Adjunct Professor of Psychology at UCLA. She was the administrator for the UCLA Psychology Clinic for 19 years. She has also worked as the Director of the Counseling Center at the University of California.

In addition to her administrative work, she has been a writer, teacher, researcher, and educator. She has also practice privately to help people take charge of their lives and make important changes.

While she is able to look at psychology from a clinical and research perspective, she can also help every day people to understand the principles that make change possible. In Take Charge Living, you'll learn practical applications for making changes step by step.

Dr. Jacobs currently is a resident of Laguna Beach, California. She is very active in her community, but also knows how to enjoy the important things in life such as family and friends. She can be found walking her Australian Shepherd in the California hills and also enjoys cooking, writing, and sailing.

You've heard it time and time again - people don't change. But that's simply not true. In fact, think about your own life and who you were 10 years ago. Are you the same person? Do you have exactly the same interests and routines? Probably not.

Change is actually the great constant in life. We are always changing and growing. But somehow when you look at the possibility of making big changes in your life, they become scary and overwhelming.

Jacobs will help you to understand that change is not only possible, but it will help you to create the life you really want to live. Instead of becoming a victim to circumstances and other people's behaviors, you can look within and be empowered to change your own life.

Don't be surprised if there's some resistance or sabotage when it comes to changing your life. There are many people who are happy with things the way they are and when they see you making positive changes; they may not like it very much. In Take Charge Living, you'll learn exactly how to handle those people and how to continue with the growth process you've begun.

Change is essential to life - so why not make changes that will improve yours? By reading Take Charge Living you'll be making the first step to improving your life and overcoming any obstacle in your path.

For many people, especially in our fast-paced society, it's frustrating when things don't change instantly. You want to instantly lose 50 pounds, instantly stop smoking, and instantly improve their marriage. But the problem is, change takes time. It won't happen overnight - and that's okay.

The good news is that there are strategies you can use to make change happen more quickly. In Take Charge Living, you'll learn how you can practice behaviors to help speed up your life changes and improve your life more quickly. It takes dedication and commitment.

In fact, many people have trouble because they know they need to change, but there are times when they just don't feel like doing it. However, when you commit to making a change, you commit to practicing different behaviors whether you feel like it or not. This is a key principle to change. But once you practice the new behaviors for a period of time, your feelings will also improve.

Jacobs will help you to understand simple steps and actions you can take to improve your life as quickly as possible. The more you put into the process, the more you'll get out of it. And when you commit to change - even if you don't feel like it - you will have success.

So many people are unhappy with themselves and the way they're living, but do nothing to change. It's not because they don't want to change. They simply don't believe they're capable of it.

Take Susan, a painfully shy woman who envies people who speak up. Susan believes with all her heart it's impossible for her to ever be like them. She remembers that even as a toddler standing in a little flowered pink dress in the living room, relatives laughed and teased, "Cat got your tongue Suzie?" In Susan's mind, her shyness is as inborn, god-given and as unchangeable a part of herself as any of her body parts. The irony is, that belief, not her shyness, is what keeps Susan's life stuck. Thinking she can't speak up, she doesn't try. Not trying reinforces her belief that she can never change, so of course she continues to avoid trying. The shyness that has ruled Susan's life has never been challenged, or even questioned. That's such a shame because with guidance and practice, Susan most definitely could learn to speak up. Susan's shyness is nothing more than a learned habit, a pattern that for one reason or another got set down in childhood. Habits can be broken. Thousands of people who learn to talk up in Toastmasters support groups each year are living proof of that.

Another example of a person locked into a habit learned in childhood is Ty. He's a charming, successful businessman who chronically and automatically lies to impress others, including his wife Jean. Ty also studiously avoids saying anything that has the slightest chance of creating conflict with Jean, who, by the way, is a very caring and reasonable person. Ty is so successful at keeping his true feelings hidden from Jean, she has no idea he feels extremely lonely in the marriage. And Ty of course says nothing to surface the problem so they can deal with it. Lying and hiding his feelings are patterns Ty learned as a boy to cope as best he could with an angry and demanding father who never saw any of Ty's considerable accomplishments as good enough. Ty the adult still believes that like his father, other people would never accept him as he really is.

Let's turn the discussion to you. Do you have some habitual patterns of thinking or handling situations that are keeping your life stuck? If so, how did you learn to set such limits on yourself? Yes, I said learn. Maybe you never thought of yourself as having learned those patterns, but you did. What's more, they probably feel like such an ingrained part of who you are that you believe the feeling that you can't get rid of them. That belief-that you cannot change- which by the way happens to be dead wrong-is what keeps you stuck. Psychologists have proven many times that habitual ways of thinking and behaving can be changed. So make this your mantra: What is learned can be unlearned and something better put in its place!

Changing personal habits like shyness is much the same as changing physical habits like your golf swing or learning to drive British style on the opposite side of the road. All habit changes require time, a precise mental image of what you are trying to accomplish, planning, practice, and coaching yourself through each step. You can also expect that at first any new behavior will feel odd, unnatural, awkward, maybe even scary.

Learning new psychological habits to replace old undesirable ones is what my UCLA colleague and dear friend, Professor Gerald Goodman, would call a "boulders and BBs" problem. Your old habit, because it's so familiar and has such strong feelings connected to it, is like the boulder-big, solid, seemingly impenetrable, impossible to move. The new habit you're trying to put in its place is like a BB-small, no punch, easy to dismiss. But if you stick with changing, little by little the BB will chip away at the boulder, sapping it of its strength, draining it of its power. Meanwhile, the BB grows bigger and stronger. So with time, commitment and lots of practice, you can expect your new habit, to take over as the new boulder, while your old habit rolls into the distance, a pea-sized object of no importance.

Marion K. Jacobs, Ph.D. is a Clinical Psychologist in Laguna Beach, California, Adjunct Professor at UCLA and self-help expert. Her book and CD, Take-Charge Living: How to Recast Your Role in Life, One Scene At A Time offer a detailed plan for personal change. To learn more visit http://take-chargeliving.com

Would you say that Nadya Suleman,who already had six children, and just gave birth to eight more, is living a "take-charge" life? She's done exactly what she set out to do,and that's pretty take-charge, isn't it? Yet many people are furious at both the mother as well as the unnamed doctor that allowed this to happen.

What is the fury about as you see it?

Is it her ability to provide for fourteen children? Financial worries may be a moot point. Ms Suleman already has a couple of publicists and seems poised to rake in millions through movie and book rights to her story, not to mention well-paying ads featuring her eight adorable babies. There is even the question of whether this was planned for that purpose.

Perhaps she's hit a national nerve just by defying conventional norms and daring to be different. Or is the worry that even if she has enough food and clothing, what does it mean to spread love and attention to so many offspring?

Naturally I have thoughts about all of this. But, I'm writing this post because I really want to know what others think. Is this living a take-charge life, however unusual, or is it being out of control and not take-charge at all? Please let me hear from you!
Best,
Marion Jacobs, Ph.D.

Here are some thoughts people e-mailed to me:
I.
I doubt that this girl/mother is capable of considering what the life of each of her children will be like. They most likely will have little or no time with her to nurse, to bond, to receive parenting. She is imposing on them the very conditions which she has complained about in her own childhood (which her mother denies). Information that came to light today suggests that this girl is totally dependent on her parents for care for herself and her children. Where she got the funds for the implantations is worth investigating. I do not believe she is in charge of her life. I believe she is amoral, possibly sociopathic, and in any case, quite ill.
Lee
II.
"Of all of the public monies she used for her "endeavor", will she pay us back after the millions she makes on the backs of her little kids?"

-Andy
III,

Hi Marion

Frankly I have no opinion about that situation......glad it is not mine....and it is none of my business.

Like a friend of mine said " I have my own rat killin to do"

IV.
Yes, the octuplets mother was "take charge" in that she accomplished
> something she set out to do.
>
> But her kind of goal is rather mechanical, rather easy to accomplish in
> that it doesn't require a significant re-training of one's habits of
> thought and behavior. I mean, all this woman really had to do was undergo
> the medical procedure and have sex (or find a sperm donor, whatever the
> case may have been).
>
> On the other hand, she's taken quite a risk with her life and that of her
> (now) 14 children. However, she probably did bet on getting a lot of
> publicity - and she has - and pursuant to that all the assistance she
> might need, including help nurturing her children. - I think she and her
> kids would be still better off if she belonged to an established
> wisdom-tradition or faith-based community - like the "large family" (going
> on 18 kids) featured on the Learning Channel (TLC). They seem to be
> thriving!
>
> As for the doctors who assisted in her unusual project, they either felt
> the outcome was none of their business, they were only doing the work they
> were trained to do and earned excellent livings doing; or they were
> excited by the potential for personal professional accomplishment.
>
> But who am I or any of us to make a moral judgment in this case?
>
> We are citizens after all of a society that is experiencing the escalating
> effects of MONUMENTAL greed and lack of responsibility - to the larger
> community. This is causing a TSUNAMI of fear and irrevocable harm to
> millions of our children.
>
> And even when circumstances are "normal," we tend to tolerate conditions
> that cause irrevocable harm to millions of our children - e.g. the failed
> public school system; the fact that there are 42,000,000 children without
> health insurance; the widespread poverty in so rich a land as this.
>
> In the larger scheme of things then, the decidedly eccentric octuplet
> mom - cum couldn't-care-less- about-the-larger-picture scientists and
> doctors - situation is no big deal
Diane