What Does It Take To Change?
Why Understanding Your Patterns Isn't Enough
Here's something I see over and over in my coaching practice: brilliant women who can perfectly articulate their patterns but still find themselves trapped in them when it matters most.
They know they're people-pleasers, but still say yes when truthfully, they would rather say no.
They understand they're rescuers, but still jump in to fix everyone's problems.
They've read the books, done the therapy, identified their triggers and yet, when their teenager is melting down or their partner is stressed or their friend needs help, they slip right back into the same old responses.
In professional speak, we call this an Integration Problem. But personally, I call it “the futility of knowing”
Either way, the problem here isn’t that you are stupid or incapable of change. It’s that information is not the same as transformation and often, we learn the language of recovery long before we embody it.
So let’s address the gap between understanding our patterns and actually changing them in real-time.
When Knowing Isn't Enough
Last week, a client—let's call her Sarah—described it perfectly: "I can see myself doing it while I'm doing it. I know I'm taking on my daughter's anxiety as my own emergency. I know I'm rushing in to fix what she needs to figure out herself. But in the moment, it feels impossible not to."
Sound familiar?
This is the cruel irony of pattern work. The more aware we become, the more we can witness ourselves falling into old behaviors. We develop this split-screen experience: part of us observing, part of us still reacting from our wounding.
It's maddening. And it makes us feel like we're failing at recovery.
But you're not failing. You're just trying to bridge a gap that most therapeutic approaches don't address: the space between insight and action.
The Missing Piece
Most therapy and self-help focuses on the "why"—understanding our childhood experiences, recognizing our patterns, making meaning of our behaviors. This work is crucial, but it's only half the equation.
The missing piece is the "how"—concrete tools you can use when you're triggered, activated, or sliding into familiar patterns. Not just awareness of what's happening, but intervention in the moment it's happening.
Because here's the thing: when you're triggered, you're not operating from your wise, integrated adult self. You're operating from a younger, wounded part of you that learned these patterns as survival strategies. That part doesn't care about your insights. It cares about safety. And it will default to what it knows works.
You need tools that meet you where you are in those moments—not where you wish you were.
The Integration Bridge
The bridge between understanding and changing isn't more analysis. It's practice with concrete, in-the-moment interventions that you can actually remember and use when your nervous system is activated.
Think of it like learning to drive. You can study the manual all you want, but until you practice the physical movements—checking mirrors, pressing pedals, turning the wheel—you can't actually drive. Integration requires embodied practice, not just cognitive understanding.
The tools need to be:
Simple enough to remember when you're stressed
Physical enough to interrupt the pattern
Gentle enough that you'll actually use them (not shame yourself more)
From Reactive to Responsive
The goal isn't to never feel triggered. It's to create a pause between trigger and response—a moment where choice becomes possible.
When Sarah learned to put her hand on her chest and ask "Is this my emergency or her emergency?" she didn't stop caring about her daughter. She started responding from love rather than reacting from anxiety.
That pause—even three seconds—is where transformation happens. Not in perfect execution, but in the growing space between what happens to you and what you choose to do about it.
The integration problem is real, but it's not permanent. You can learn to catch yourself mid-pattern and choose differently.
The question isn't whether you'll get triggered—it's what you'll do in those crucial seconds after.
🔒 Do The Work - Inside today's paid section: The Integration Toolkit: In-the-Moment Tools for Breaking Old Patterns
If you're tired of understanding your patterns but not being able to change them when it counts, this toolkit will help you:
✔️ Create Pause Protocols: Simple interventions you can use when triggered to create space between reaction and response.
✔️ Pattern-Specific Strategies: Targeted tools for people-pleasers, rescuers, perfectionists, and controllers—different patterns need different approaches.
✔️ Build Your Integration Practice: How to practice these tools in low-stakes situations so they're available when you really need them.