Can People Really Change? 3 Signs Someone Will Change
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A lot of us have to recognize that change is something that has to come from within. They have to feel like this new life will be good for them, but they have to know it in their language, with their reason. They have to commit to that change. Is someone telling you they're going to change? Or is someone showing you the signs that they're ready to commit to change?

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Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose. Thank you for trusting me with your time and energy. I don't take it for granted and I'm so grateful that you've chosen to be with me here today. It's been an incredible few weeks. We've had everyone from Shawn Mendes to Andrew Huberman on the podcast, Nicole LaPera, incredible therapist and thinker, and so many more amazing guests yet to come. I also hope you've been taking a look at my

solo podcast because there have been some workshops that have really resonated with you recently. But I'm guessing you're here today because there's someone in your life that you wish would change. Maybe it's your partner. Maybe it's a parent. Maybe it's someone in your professional environment at work.

Maybe it's a sibling. Either way, there's someone in your life that you're wishing, waiting, and wanting for to change. And maybe you've tried already to help them change. Maybe you've pushed them to change. Maybe you even made the mistake of forcing them to change. And you're sitting there right now going, Jay, I just don't know if they're ever going to change.

Can people change?

That's our question for today. That's what you're thinking about. And that's what I'm going to guide you through over the next 30 minutes or so to recognize what is change? What does it look like? Is it possible? If you want to know if that person will ever change this episode for you, if you're struggling with someone because they're not changing this episode for you, and if you're someone who's just trying to figure it out, this episode is for you.

Now, the first thing I want to do is take a very factual look at change. When we look at change in society, change in community, change individually, studies show that forming a habit can take anywhere from 18 to 254 days, with an average of 66 days to form a habit.

But that's not the kind of change you're talking about. When we're asking this question, can people really change? We're talking about something far more core or fundamental. We're talking about values. We're talking about attitudes, behaviors, mindsets, right? Maybe you want someone to change the way they appreciate you. Maybe you want someone to change the way they think about care.

Maybe you want someone to change the way they talk to you, communicate with you. Maybe you want to change the way someone behaves with you. Adapting to change studies show can take around 90 days.

And seeing significant change in society can take 30 years or more. Notice the difference. Changing a habit average 66 days, adapting to a change 90 days, seeing norms set into society 30 years. So we've got to look at the person and we've got to empathize and be compassionate and realize, are they trying to change a habit? Are they adapting to a change?

Or really, is it that we're hoping that they change a norm in their life? Now, I want to give you an answer in short that, of course, people can change, but different parts of them take longer to change. And there are far more aspects that are unchangeable than we believe. And when I say unchangeable, I don't mean that it's impossible or will never happen.

I mean that the waiting time may be so long that it may feel like forever. So one interesting study talks about this idea of how it's actually quite hard over time for people to change core personality traits.

So people can change their personality, but it's hard to change core personality traits. Like if someone's an extrovert or an introvert, it's hard to change. Someone's not just going to shift from one to the other. If someone's a homebody or wants to travel the world, that's not going to change overnight.

If someone is more likely to be open than closed, i.e. emotionally available, it's not easy for someone who's emotionally disconnected or unavailable to suddenly become available overnight. These are far more core personality traits that are much more difficult to see changes in.

Now, one study I looked at talked about how hurtful behaviors such as lying, cheating, dismissing or controlling. And this is from Psych Central. They say are often habits that turn into harmful behavior patterns.

And research from 2020 explains personality may be shaped by an interaction between multiple sources, from genes to events and social relationships, rather than only one source. The study goes on to say that personality development isn't linear and change isn't either.

So what's really interesting about that is even when people change, we think of change as linear. We think that if someone changes, everything changes. When actually what happens in reality is that even if someone changes,

chances are they're going to oscillate back and forth to their former self. So you're going to constantly ask the question, wait a minute, I thought you changed. Wait a minute, I thought you understood. Wait a minute, I thought you got the message. And the truth is it's more likely that someone's going to oscillate back and forth until they get there. So behavior can be learned and unlearned.

But the amount of time it can take, the levels it can go to in order for that to happen can be very, very hard to go through. Now, here's the reality I want to get through to you. You can't change anyone. You can only change yourself. You can't force someone to change. You can't push someone to change. You can't beg someone to change. They will change when they want to change.

They will change when they feel a need to change. They will change when they're ready for change. When it impacts them so badly that they're not changing, that's when they'll choose to change.

Changing someone else is not within your control and trying to find ways to do it can be exhausting. So what I'd rather give you is signs that someone is likely to change, because often what we do is we keep asking the question, can people change? And really, it's the wrong question, because people can change. But is the person that you're with likely to change?

Is the person that you're talking about likely to change? These are the signs that they're likely to change. And that's a healthier, better, smarter question to ask because what you're really asking when you ask, can people change, is, is my person going to change? Are they going to be different? And there are certain signs that point you in the right direction.

The first one is they own up and take accountability and are self-aware about not only what change is required, but why the change is required. Sometimes someone will say to you, I know I need to change. I know it isn't right. And we get so happy and elated that they acknowledged it, that we take that acknowledgement as accountability. There's a difference. There is a difference between acknowledgement and accountability.

Acknowledgement is recognizing something. Accountability is reconciling something. Let me say that again. Acknowledgement is recognizing something. Accountability is reconciling something. When you're accountable, you actually have the ability to articulate what the problem is, why it exists, and how you're going to show up

in the future, you're taking accountability for your actions, your behaviors, and you're able to see the connection between how you act and how it affects the other person. I promise you that most people

that you're talking to are simply acknowledging the problem. They're not actually taking accountability, but because we don't know the difference, we assume they're the same thing. Now, assuming they're the same thing isn't a great idea because if you assume that they're the same thing,

then you think someone's taken accountability, but no accountability means I know how my actions affected you. I know why my actions affected you. I can articulate it and I know how my actions affect you and I know which actions I need to change. And by the way, I know why I need to change them. I know why I am that way. Notice the difference between acknowledgement and accountability.

Now, once someone's taken accountability, they have to want to change. They have to have the proper motivation to change. Because just because someone can articulate and take accountability doesn't mean that they feel the need to change. They have to feel that change is necessary. If you look at most humans, we only change when we believe something's necessary, right? If we think something's going to end, we change.

If we think something new is going to start, we change, right? We change when it happens. Most people want to get promoted before they change their performance, not realizing that you get a promotion because you changed your performance. There's a reason why the famous phrase of you don't know what you've got until it's gone, because we wait till we lose something to know we should have changed.

That's how human behavior and the human mind works is we constantly feel that until something's necessary, until something is required of me, I won't do it. Until I feel the pressure to, I won't do it. What often we do is we try and put that pressure on that person to change. We try and force them to change. But we don't realize that if they change for us, but they don't know why they're changing themselves.

they may actually feel regret. I like to think about this through a scenario. If someone changes for you, then that means that they didn't really go through the process within themselves. They haven't really looked at the value and therefore they may actually be depressed about that change. They may be down about that change. They may not wish that change ever happened to them.

I'll give you an example. Radhi and me, Radhi always told me that all she wanted to do was live close to her family. And I wanted that for her because I love her family and I know how much she loves them.

And then when I got the opportunity, of course, to move across the world, to change my career, change my life and do what I get to do today. And Radhi and I were already married and it was a hard change for Radhi. And I said to Radhi that I didn't want her to move for me. I wanted her to do it because she saw value in it and she could find it for herself. Now she had to adapt to that change. It was hard for her. And I was trying my best to help her with that change. I didn't want her to change.

And I didn't want her to feel pressure to change because I realized that unless something comes from within, unless something comes from that person, they are never really going to fully commit to it.

And that's what's really interesting. Sometimes we're trying to get people to change on the surface. We're trying to get people to change their behavior for us. And we don't realize that when they do that, not only does it not stick, when it doesn't come from within, it doesn't feel like it's meaningful to them. So they can't truly get behind that change long term. And they may even feel like it's your fault.

They might feel like it's a mistake. They may feel like it was the worst decision they made in the long term. And a lot of us have to recognize that change is something that has to come from within. They have to feel like this new life will be good for them. But they have to know it in their language, with their reason. They have to commit to that change.

Is someone telling you they're going to change? Or is someone showing you the signs that they're ready to commit to change?

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People that I admire. When we say listen to your body, really tune in to what's going on. Authors of books that have changed my life. Now you're talking about sympathy, which is different than empathy, right? And basically have conversations that can help us get through this crazy thing we call life. I already believe in myself. I already see myself. And so when people give me an opportunity, I'm just like, oh great, you see me.

A lot of the time people will say the right thing because they're people pleasers. They don't want to lose you. They want to say all the right things to hold on to you. But they haven't committed to that change.

Right. They haven't put steps into place. They haven't had the awkward, uncomfortable conversation. They haven't stepped up and done the things that are hard for them. Is someone committing to change? And often what we do is we just keep going mad. We keep getting angry at them saying, I wish you would change. You keep telling me you're going to change, but you don't change. But they're not committing to that action.

One of the things I've been saying to a lot of people I know recently is don't expect change to happen in one therapy session. What we're often hoping is that lifetimes of work will become clear to someone through a couple of sessions of therapy.

What I mean by that is our wiring is so deep. There are values that we've held on to because of our childhood that don't just disappear because someone else presents a better idea. I'll give an example, a silly example.

If you've always put your cereal in the bowl before your milk, by the way, that's the normal way, no judgment, right? And you start dating someone who puts milk in before the cereal, you don't just switch to doing that, right? Now that's a really silly example. It's a really easy change. It doesn't make a difference. But if you think about it, there are things you think about first. Sometimes some of you think about money before you think about people because that's how you were raised.

You're not going to change that overnight because you start dating someone who thinks about people before money, even if it makes logical sense to that person, right? People don't just change their values, their core belief systems overnight just because someone else's sounds good, right? If someone believes, I've been watching and I'm sure many of you have seen it, Monsters

Now, no matter what you believe, just taking this idea of even if someone's parents have done harm to them, have done them wrong, if they love their parents and feel positively towards them because they feel somehow, you know, whether it was they felt guilty, they felt shameful that they had to feel that way, that's how they were raised. They're not suddenly just going to see the light because you made them aware of a few things. Actually, it's very hard for people to admit that.

that their parents have flaws, that there are challenges, that there are, you know, difficulties there. And you see that in the Menendez brothers who struggle to recognize certain challenges. Now, whatever happened in that scenario, you get the point I'm making, that it's not easy to acknowledge things that are so counterintuitive to the way you've been raised.

If your parents were savers, not spenders, you're not suddenly gonna realize that actually spending money meaningfully is better for you. It takes a lot of healing, it takes a lot of work, it takes a lot of unearthing. And so one therapy session or a couple of therapy sessions or a month of therapy or coaching or whatever it may be won't make the change. Now, by the way, you're all chipping away, but I think when we want someone to change, we're just hoping, wishing, wanting, waiting that they're just gonna change. Now, signs that someone's changing

is they start to course correct. When they say something to you that they realize is their old voice, they call it out. They say, wait a minute, I just realized that was my old voice speaking. They start to recognize how the smallest actions are a representation of their old self. And really, that's what it is. You have to think about it as a transformation of

from an old to new self, right? And if someone's transforming from their old to new self, they will go between their old and new self often. It's not like you transition once. It's almost like saying, I'm going to quit eating sugar. It's not like you never eat sugar again, right? If you're like, I'm going to be healthy now and work out, it doesn't mean you're never going to miss a workout again,

And sometimes we hold people to really crazy high standards that doesn't make sense, right? We want them to never, ever oscillate. We want them to never, ever fall back. The other way we know signs of change is, are we trying to change? Are we trying to make a difference?

Right. Are we willing to change as well? Are we able to do the same work that we're expecting this person to do? Are we willing to do that same work for ourselves and for this relationship? A lot of the time, it's really easy to point out where everyone else needs to change, but it's really hard to be conscious of where we need to change.

And I think for a lot of us, we're trying to mold someone into being more like us. We want them to think like us. We want them to talk like us. Now, there may be certain value to that. Like you may have some really great skills and you may have some really great attributes, but are you willing to change to some of their better attributes? Are you aware of their better attributes? Are you able to identify their better attributes or have you lost connection with them?

There's a lot to be said for community and change. I find that if you're the only person reminding this person of the positive benefits of change, it's hard to change. We often need, when we hear that phrase of we are the five people we spend the most time with, it's so true that someone will not change unless the people around them change. I've met so many people over the years who are part of a community who thinks that

in a very old fashioned way. They're not going to suddenly upgrade to a modern way of thinking. I'll give an example. Like in my Indian community back at home, it's not normal for a husband and wife to travel separately so often. So me and Riley travel separately a lot.

And sometimes I'm at an event and she's not. Sometimes she's at an event and I'm not. And people will always be like, is everything OK? Because in that world, even if you're arguing in the car before you pull up to the wedding event, even if you argue on the way home from the birthday party because you came and left together, it's seen as positive. Let me just explain that again.

People always ask me and Ravi, is everything okay? Because we often don't show up to the same events together because we're both busy. And people would rather argue on the way to a wedding or fight on the way back just to show that they came and left together in order to prove to society that they have a healthy relationship than actually having a healthy relationship.

And so the perception in that society is togetherness, i.e. arriving and leaving together is the sign of a healthy relationship. Now, that perception doesn't change overnight. That's a deep-seated belief, as ridiculous as it sounds, that that is what a successful relationship is.

And so people live up to that falsehood and people live up to that fake level of quality of a relationship rather than one with good communication and respect and boundaries and permission to be who we are. So that's just not going to change overnight. Like someone's not going to change their view overnight of what's seen as a healthy marriage, as a healthy relationship. And I think this hits very closely to why I partnered up with Matche

And what I really found was I wanted to create a space where people could connect based on their values. And this was really, really important to me because I feel that everything I'm saying here is because we don't realize that our core values

have such a big impact in terms of long-term success. If you ignore core values, you're thinking in the next five months. If you take on core values, you're living in the next five years. And for anyone who's interested and invested in building a long-term, long-lasting, powerful relationship, this mindset is huge. 93% of Match members say that shared core values are a crucial indicator of relationship success.

And if I'm completely honest, most people have never even looked at these ideas. Most people have never even had the opportunity, the time, the space, the energy, given these thoughts, a moment of thought. Most people have never even had the option to say, okay, well, let me just take a look at this for a second. Like, how do I feel about this? What are my beliefs about this? Most people have never even done that.

So when you're in a relationship with someone, you're actually going through the process of making someone aware of the process they need to go through. It's not even like, you know, are you ready to change? Do you know you need to change? It's almost like you've got to start from scratch with yourself and the other person of like, are we even living the life we want? Do you know what your values are? Are we conscious? So the question isn't, do you know you need to change? You know you're wrong, right? You know there's parts of you that just met, like, that's not the conversation, right?

The conversation is, hey, do we know where this relationship's going? Do we know what choices we've made? Are we aware of what this unfolds like? Have we talked about our past and how it's affected us? Do we know how our core values and beliefs, what kind of foundation they are? It's almost like rather than criticizing someone for their bad taste in interior design, you're actually talking about like, hey, should we both get educated on the foundations of relationships?

Should we both become really aware of where we're going and what's going on? I really want you to reflect on this because sometimes I think we're starting the wrong conversation because we were actually expecting people to be more emotionally mature than anyone in the world has actually had the opportunity to be. You may be the person in your relationship who has to start the healthy conversation that has to start the useful conversation.

I really hope that these tips help you in this person you want to change. Remember, they won't change for you. They won't change for me. They won't change for anyone. They'll only change for themselves.

And you can't make them change. However, you can open them to the idea of reevaluating their beliefs to become self-aware, to understand where their current choices will take them, to help them understand where their current trauma and upbringing will guide them.

And you can help them become more aware through self-reflection, but you can't tell them it, force them to it. And if you do, I promise you, it won't be the change you're really looking for. So I hope this helps. I hope this serves you. I want you to remember I'm always rooting for you. I'm forever in your corner. And I'm so grateful that you trust in me with your time and energy to join me here today. I wish you all the best in your relationships. People can change, but they don't change for me. They don't change for you. They change for themselves. They need to feel accountable.

They need to be committed to it. They need time. They need patience. And ultimately, you need to realize that there are parts of them that may never change. And that doesn't mean they can't love you and you can't love them and they can't respect you and you can't respect them. Often what we want people to change isn't integral to them loving us. It's just because we want to feel a certain way.

Thank you for listening. I'll see you again on the next episode of On Purpose. I appreciate you deeply. Take care. If you love this episode, you'll really enjoy my episode with Selena Gomez on befriending your inner critic and how to speak to yourself with more compassion. My fears are only going to continue to show me what I'm capable.

The more that I face my fears, the more that I feel I'm gaining strength and gaining wisdom, and I just want to keep doing that. In 1982, Atari players had one game on their minds: Sword Quest.

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