My friend John Bevere has just published a powerful book for Christians, titled Driven by Eternity.
How do I know it’s a powerful book?
Because it triggers “the power button of human nature,” something I describe in my recently published book, Automatic Influence: New Power for Change in Life and Work.
A Better Way to Change
My expertise is the psychology of change. For two decades now I’ve been researching the forces that drive human nature and how to use those forces to lead better and to live better.
I’ve found that people who want to change things often go about it the wrong way. Whether they’re leaders trying to influence followers, employers trying to influence workers, parents trying to influence children, or people trying to improve themselves, they focus on behavior-change and attitude-change, only to wear themselves out and lapse back to status quo.
But there’s a better and easier way to change…one that uses this “power button.”
The Power of Perspective
What is this power button? Perspective. Call it perception, focus, or attention, it’s all the same thing: the way we “see.” It’s not just physical sight, but what we mean when we say, “I call it the way I see it.” We look around at ourselves, others, and situations. We pick up views of life and reality. We constantly use our memory, our imagination, and our senses to ask and answer these questions:
- What is happening, what is real? In this way, we characterize reality.
- How good or bad is it? In this way, we evaluate reality.
We do this so quickly and intuitively that it’s impossible to notice. It happens in a blink.
But it’s easy to notice the effects of our perspectives in our motivations and behaviors. The way we see has an instant and automatic influence on the way we feel. Which means our motivations never come out of left field. They’re always preceded by appraisal – by our view of self, others, situations, and life. This is what the Greek philosopher Epictetus meant when he wrote, “Men are not moved by things, but the views which they take of things.” Things don’t move us as much as our view of things moves us.
Which means the best strategy for change is, start with perspective. When we change the view, we change the emotions and motivations and attitudes and behaviors. Automatically.
Seeing Eternity
Now let’s think about our view of time, and how it triggers our motivations. Imagine we’re at a party and there’s a dessert table loaded with goodies. If our only thought is here and now, then we’ll want to eat as much as we can. We’ll load up our plate because dessert tastes fantastic. An extremely narrow view of time creates a specific set of motivations and behaviors.
But when our view of time stretches out a few months, we imagine getting fat from all that eating. Suddenly, the motivation changes. We’re not as interested in dessert. We might take only one piece of fudge instead of a whole plate full. Or we might not take any at all.
The same thing happens when we stretch out the time frame from months to years to life
times and to eternity. Every new frame is a new view which creates new motivations, emotions, and behaviors.
Now back to John’s book, Driven by Eternity. It’s a book-length look at the biggest time frame there is, enabling readers to get eternity in view and keep it in view for a better life. This new view automatically triggers new emotions and motivations, which then triggers new decisions and behaviors. “I believe when you read this book,” says John, “you’re going to see life totally different. You’re going to see it through a different lens. You’re going to endure things better, you’re going to make decisions differently, because you’re not living with an eighty-year perspective. You’re living with an eternal perspective.”
Instead of just demanding Christians live better or change this or do that, which many Christian leaders do, John takes a more powerful approach. He first gives Christians a new view, then dives into the motives and behaviors that make for the best Christian life.
As all great leaders do, John pushes the power button to make change easier and more effective.
Erik Van Alstine is a strategic thinker who helps people radically change the way they lead and live. To get his new book, Automatic Influence: New Power for Change in Work and Life, click here.
