Being Reactive & Proactive

Being Reactive

Reactive people are essentially like characters in a movie, playing out the script.They often resemble powerless victims, having their lives run by external factors. They have little control over their emotions.Instead their emotions are dictated by someone or something else; by circumstance and the outside environment.

Looked through the window to see rain and grey clouds, and decided it’s a miserableday. Been criticised by someone at work or home and consequently felt down for hours afterwards. Watched our sports team win a game and felt on cloud nine for a week.For better or worse, these are all examples of reactive behaviour, where our feelings depend on the results of external events or processes that we have no control over. They are completely outside our sphere of influence, yet they can control our lives.

We are all guilty of being reactive from time to time, often without even knowing. For most people it’s the default program. I know I’m guilty. But whether we realise it or not, we choose to subordinate ourselves to those forces that are outside our sphere of influence.We choose to experience happiness, unhappiness, anger, frustration, boredom and elation. We chooseto create the habits of wallowing in self-pity, shifting the blame, and feeling powerless.

Being Proactive

When we are told that the situations we find ourselves in and the emotions we experience are largely from our own doing, it can be hard to accept. It involves a huge paradigm shift, with us taking responsibility for our current circumstances.The natural reaction is often to resist and to argue otherwise, until eventually the light bulb flicks on. The eureka moment occurs — the realisation that we are in fact in control. If we can choose to be reactive and be controlled by external factors, we can also choose not to be.When we are proactive, we only concern ourselves with things that are inside our sphere of influence, rather than worrying about things we can’t do anything about. We look towards what we are able to control and change, and this includes the way we react to any given situation.

We can’t always directly alter how someone else behaves or talks to us. We have no control over the weather. We don’t even have a say in how our favourite team will do on the weekend. But we can choose our thought processes and our responses.

Being proactive is not a case of being a robot and having no emotions. Rather, it’s being in complete control over your emotions. It’s making the transition — from other people and circumstances being in charge, to being in charge of yourself.

Instead of shifting the blame elsewhere, you can begin to carry the responsibility. You stop thinking that the external circumstances need to change, and realise that you can instead alter yourself internally. The proactive approach is one that

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