Nonfiction Book Review: AdaptAbility: How to Survive Change You Didn’t Ask For

In the spring of 2011, after Dad had passed and we’d decided to move to Florida, I found the book, AdaptAbility: How to Survive Change You Didn’t Ask For by M.J. Ryan, at a bookstore’s closing sale. We were in the process of moving – our lives in transition as my spouse had already started working in Florida, and I finished up the house sale and my job in Virginia. The book, published when the world felt upside down from financial meltdown, had an eye-catching subtitle: How to Survive Change You Didn’t Ask For.

Some of the change I was experiencing was “asked for” in that I had decided to move to Florida. But my decision was in response to many other changes that I didn’t ask for – Mom’s illness, Dad’s death, the tanking economy, and job security fears. I imagined I would adjust and assimilate and then go about the same life as before, just in a different location. I had no premonition of the ongoing effects of all that change and my subsequent reaction.

And so here I am again with a great deal more unexpected unasked for change. I pulled this book out many times over the past seven years. I mentioned it as a favorite at a job interview (for a job I didn’t get).

Author M. J. Ryan starts by listing the Seven Truths of Change followed by 54 essays that move the reader through four major steps for mastering change: Acceptance, Expanding Your Options, Taking Action, and Strengthening AdaptAbility. The book is chock full of gems, anecdotes, and helpful actions. Each time you open the book you find something helpful and I like turning to a random page and reading wherever I happen to land.

For example, in the Introduction you’ll find Ryan’s reassurance that once you’re aware of the steps you can take for adapting to the unexpected, you can face future changes with greater confidence. That’s the premise of the book. And yet, I still am not a person who welcomes change. Dr. Leman would probably point out that I’m a firstborn and firstborns are not wild about change given how their early experiences with change were so life-altering.

Not all changes are life-altering. As Ryan points out and as her work focuses on, our jobs and workplaces are constantly changing as companies merge or adjust to the economy and new technology. Industries are in constant upheaval in ways never before seen.

The one thing that stays the same is change, as we’ve heard ad nauseum now. Change can be mountainous and change can be a mole hill. Having a guide and advisor while navigating change is invaluable.

In my most recent grappling with change, I find the book’s Truth #4 especially relevant: “Change isn’t the enemy, fear is.” Most of the book provides techniques for having less of a fight/flight/freeze response to change and instead accepting the situation, expanding our options, and making necessary adjustments. I’m poring over these sections again.

And Truth #7 gives helpful encouragement: “Your future is built on bedrock that is unchanging.” This bedrock, Ryan explains, is made up of the four elements that make you, you. Then she delves into what this means and what those elements are in the Expand Your Options section which takes up a good one third of the book. There’s so much mind expanding information in just this section.

No surprise for a book person like me that I find the following suggestion from this section appealing: as a tool for understanding the transition you’re going through, give a title to episodes from your past like chapters in a book. And then consider what the current life circumstance could be titled. What about your next one?

Some other favorite quotes:

We can respond to change by using “the pressure to become more of who we are and to offer more of what we have to give.”

page 146

The story you tell yourself about what’s happening can make change either a terrible thing or a portal to new possibilities.

page 54

M. J. Ryan is one of the creators of the Random Acts of Kindness series and is a personal coach with Professional Thinking Partners. She was a publisher and has also written at least 10 books. The copy of AdaptAbility that I have is the first edition and has now been republished with a new title: How to Survive Change…You Didn’t Ask For: Bounce Back, Find Calm in Chaos, and Reinvent Yourself. Obviously the original subtitle was striking for most people, not just me.

I like how Ryan incorporates neuroscience, organizational and positive psychology, and spirituality into her essays. Her tone is informative and encouraging. There are around 50 or more stories of people facing change at different stages. You can take all 54 actions or just one or a few. Anything you do to cope with change will help you. When you’re going through change, this book is like that trusted experienced friend who can give you reliable advice.

There are nuggets of great advice on every page – and often more than one nugget. Very Highly Recommended.

Book cover by carynwrites
Woman at crossroad by Pixource from Pixabay / filtered from original