How Can You Tell It's Time to Commit to a New Path?

This is Johanna Rothman’s June 2025 Create an Adaptable Life Newsletter. The unsubscribe link is at the bottom of this email.

Several of my colleagues and dear friends are in the midst of chaos. They want to do something new and create new opportunities for themselves. Tom is looking for a job. Andrea wants to become a full-time fiction writer. And Jane wants to be a consultant. All of them have experimented with various Transforming Ideas. And they all have this in common: they have experimented enough to know they can take this new opportunity. Now, it’s time to commit—and that’s the scary part.

If you are not familiar with the Satir Change Model, read Change Is Inevitable for a brief explanation.

That commitment scares them, so they stay stuck, bouncing between Chaos and their Transforming Idea. Each of them worries about “pulling the plug” and committing to the Practice and Integration they need to create their New Status Quo.

Instead of making a “final” decision, I asked Tom, Andrea, and Jane to consider these ideas:

Your decision does not have to be permanent. (Very few decisions can be permanent.)
How many ways can you change how you work now so you can commit to a new career?
How can you use the Rule of Three to avoid failure?

Let me start with idea instead of a permanent decision, consider how often to recommit to that decision.

Decisions Require Re-Commitment Regularly

Think of a work or life decision you made more than a year ago. (Let’s exclude marriages, because there’s so much more that goes into a marriage.) Now, think of the number of times you recommitted to that same decision. In my experience, the longer ago you made that decision, the more times you had to recommit to it.

Every time you decide to not look for a new job, or not look for a new place to live, or not change something, you recommitted to that original decision. Tom, the job-seeker, originally decided several years ago to bicycle to work at least two days a week. Then, he tried bicycling after a blizzard. He changed an aspect of that decision to say that he would bicycle unless it’s snowing or icy. He has recommitted to that new decision each year for the past five years.

Instead of looking for final decisions, consider reframing this decision as a “decision for now.” Then, you can decide when to recommit to that decision.

That recommitting might require changing how you practice those decisions. One way is to change how you work on a daily basis.

Change How You Work Now to Prepare to Commit

Andrea is working on finding more time for fiction writing. She chose to change a little aspect of her schedule to find more times to write during the day, even if each time is a shorter duration. (She used to try to block out an hour for her fiction. Now she blocks out anywhere from ten to 20 minutes. That’s it.) But she has more shorter blocks of time, so she is able to change how she works now.

In addition, she and Jane, the future consultant, use the Rule of Three to avoid failure.

Consider the Rule of Three to Avoid Failure

When we commit to a new path, we often have to relinquish the current path. That’s why this question can help us create more options:

What are three ways I can achieve what I want?

When Tom answered that question, he decided he could consider contracting and volunteering for open source development while he looks for a new job. He suspected he could use the contracting and volunteering to build his network, too.

In addition to shorter writing time blocks during the day, Andrea decided that she could wake up early and write for an hour. (That doesn’t work for me.) That extra writing time would allow her to publish more, which would help her find more readers. That’s a combination goal of changing her writing time, and focusing on publishing more often. That might offer her more options for how and when to commit to being a full-time writer.

Jane decided she could take on fractional manager roles, and speaking, in addition to the consulting she already knew she wanted.

It didn’t take long before each of these people knew when it was time to commit.

Practice Can Help Us Know When It’s Time to Commit to a New Path

Because Tom, Andrea, and Jane practiced with their various alternatives, they felt a lot more comfortable knowing when it was time to commit. Tom got a job offer from his contracting role. Because Andrea practiced her writing more, she became a better writer. As a result, she attracted the attention of several anthology editors for more publication. Jane found one client as a result of one fractional senior leader role.

Each of them practiced and networked with people. They offered value as they finalized their experimentation. That allowed them to commit and stop being stuck in Chaos.

Let me know if you consider or try this, too.

This newsletter touches on topics in these books:

Announcements…

I have the first batch of comments on Effective Public Speaking: How to Use Content Marketing With Stories to Show Your Value. I hope to finish my edits this weekend. Then it’s off to my copyeditor and all that finishing work. I’m planning a Kickstarter to publish the paper books. When I have the link for that Kickstarter, I’ll let you know.

If you are part of the agile community, consider checking out The Agile Network. Also, don’t miss out on discounted membership options. Use Discount Code: ROTHMANPMC33 to get 33% OFF all memberships. I’m speaking several times at the June micro-conference in two weeks.

Decisions Require Re-Commitment Regularly

Change How You Work Now to Prepare to Commit

Consider the Rule of Three to Avoid Failure

Practice Can Help Us Know When It’s Time to Commit to a New Path

Read More

Announcements…

Read More of Create an Adaptable Life

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