Willfulness and Willingness How Change Fits Into Our Day-to-Day Lives

Willfulness and Willingness are two mindsets that affect how much we can or want to change. The first, Willfulness, is a rejection of our ability to change. This might look like refusing to try new things, insisting on doing things in a particular manner, or holding onto opinions even if they are effectively challenged. If you would describe someone as “stubborn”, that person probably leans toward Willfulness.  

Willfulness is a natural state of mind. When we are Willful, we are telling ourselves that we are right and that our perspective on things is correct. The problem with Willfulness is that it limits us to one manner of thinking and acting. If a situation requires us to think or act differently to be effective, we might struggle, engage in conflict, or lose something that we want. 

The opposite of Willfulness is Willingness, which is our openness to change. When we are Willing, we acknowledge that there are other ways to think and act, and we consider these options on their own merits. This lets us be more effective in a wider range of situations and increases our chance of getting what we want. 

For instance, let’s consider a person named Sam. Sam is naturally loud and boisterous, and prefers moving around to sitting still. Sam is great at their job in sales and is popular at parties. They also find it hard to go to museums, theaters, and the library, because these places expect behaviors that don’t come naturally to them. 

In this case, Willfulness could look like Sam refusing to go to these places because they don’t want to change their behavior. It could also result in Sam going to these places and behaving inappropriately, leading to problems. Willingness, on the other hand, would be Sam considering what changes need to be made to go to these quieter spaces, and then deciding if/how they want to implement them.  

Authenticity 

At first glance, some people struggle with Willingness because they believe it requires us to be inauthentic and ignore our sense of self. This is certainly not the case! Willingness does not invalidate our core principles or tendencies. Instead, it asks us to look at all our choices in a situation, not just the easiest and most obvious. And once we’ve considered our options, we might decide to go with the most natural one. That’s an skillful result, because we considered all our choices and made a well-informed decision. 

Willingness is not designed to suppress who we are—it’s designed to expand our possibilities. You can be naturally loud and still enjoy being quiet. You can be an introvert and still have a good time with others. You can change your mind about something and still be true to yourself. After all, we change and grow every day. Willingness is a way of controlling that growth so we can do what we need to do and be who we want to be.