Change your life with a pointillist approach

So you want to change your life for the better, eh?

What’s stopping you?

For a lot of people, it’s just the sheer size of the change they think they need. There’s a feeling that, if something is out of whack, the solution is wholesale change.

And while wholesale change might very well address the problem, it has one significant drawback. Very often it…

…just

…doesn’t

…happen.

It feels too big and overwhelming, and turns into something to take on next week/month/year “when I’m ready.” And of course there’s always this rolling buffer between now and whenever “ready” is.

Take a pointer from the pointillists

What’s a better option? Try taking a page from the pointillist playbook.

Pointillism was a school of painting in the late 1800s, around the same time as the impressionists were making their mark in the art world.

Instead of using brush strokes to create their pictures, pointillists would apply small dots of paint. The effect up close looks, well, like a bunch of dots of paint.

But when you step back, those dots actually blend to create an image.

I find that idea a super helpful analogy for how we can approach positive change in our lives. Rather than limiting ourselves with a sweeping broad brush approach to change, we can look for opportunities to apply small dots of paint and incorporate more of what we’re looking for into our day-to-day existence. The more dots you apply, the more they start to color your overall perception and experience of your life.

“Life pointillism” in action

As an example, take a client I worked with who, as we unpacked what she found energizing and engaging, saw that a big source of juice for her was helping people. It was her natural mode, and something she found a lot of pleasure and satisfaction doing.

As an experiment, she decided that for the next week she would look for opportunities to help, whether that was in the workplace or in the rest of her life. Mostly the things she found were small in scale, but there were a lot. And every time she took action on that, it added a little energized dot of paint to her canvas.

When we talked about it the next week, she shared how much of a difference it had made. Taking action on the opportunities wherever they showed up felt good, and the more she did it, the more opportunities she noticed. It was a virtuous cycle.

Adding more helping-people dots to the canvas of her daily life had the cumulative effect of making her days feel more energizing, engaging, and meaningful.  

You can take a pointillist to anything you want more of in your life. Maybe it’s more of what energizes you. Or more creativity. Or more of what feels meaningful. Or more connection with people.

The bottom line is, there is so much more positive change available when we look for small opportunities, and act on them frequently.  

Try this: Put your finger on something you would like to do or feel more of in your life. Here’s a quick laundry list to get your ideas flowing.

Activities that give you a greater experience of:

• Energy
• Self-care
• Fun
• Creativity
• Meaning
• Connection and community
• Learning
• Exploration

Once you put your finger on one thing you would like to do or feel more of in your life, brainstorm as many ways as you can think of to experience that. Make a list (and keep adding to the list over time as you think of more ideas). They should be small. Aim to make them doable in, say, 15 minutes or less. Bigger is fine as well on occasion, but just remember that your goal is to add many small dots of paint, not coat your entire canvas with one huge blob.

To start pointillizing your life, start out with a bite-size and doable goal, like adding one of those dots each day. Start off doing it for one week, and build on that from there.

Dot by dot, your life can take on a new look and feel.