Master of Change

What if everything you thought you knew about stability was wrong? In Master of Change, Brad Stulberg argues that the pursuit of permanence—a central story modern society tells us—is at odds with the true nature of life. Instead of resisting disruption, Stulberg invites us to build what he calls rugged flexibility—the ability to stay strong at your core while adapting like water to constant transformation.

He contends that we are conditioned to see change as an anomaly, a problem to solve, a storm to endure until 'things get back to normal.' Yet, both science and ancient wisdom say otherwise: change is not the exception; it’s the rule. To live well, we must stop clinging to the illusion of stability and instead learn how to navigate life’s ongoing cycle of order, disorder, and reorder.

Across disciplines—from biology and neuroscience to philosophy and psychology—Stulberg shows that thriving systems don’t resist change; they transform with it. This book offers a comprehensive model for how to achieve such transformation, weaving together fresh scientific insights with timeless teachings from Stoicism, Buddhism, and Taoism. His core message: with the right mindset, identity, and actions, change need not be feared—it can be mastered.

Life Is Not a Straight Line

At the heart of Stulberg’s argument lies a simple but revolutionary shift in perspective. For more than a century, modern science leaned on a model called homeostasis, the idea that living systems seek to maintain equilibrium by resisting change. But this model—developed by 19th-century physiologist Claude Bernard and popularized by Walter Cannon—misrepresents how complex systems actually evolve. In reality, Stulberg explains, life operates through allostasis: achieving stability through change, not by avoiding it. Healthy systems—whether individuals, ecosystems, or organizations—operate in cycles of order → disorder → reorder. Growth doesn’t mean returning to where we started; it means finding stability at a new place entirely.

In this model, disorder isn’t a threat but a necessary stage of transformation. It’s when we grow, innovate, and evolve—if we know how to stay grounded in the process. Stulberg calls this skill rugged flexibility: being simultaneously tough and adaptable, disciplined yet open. “To be rugged,” he writes, “is to be strong and durable. To be flexible is to bend without breaking. Together, they form the quality you need to thrive.”

From Control to Conversation

According to Stulberg, embracing this framework means shifting from trying to control change to entering into conversation with it. Life ceases to be something that happens to you and becomes something that you are in dialogue with. Resistance depletes you; responsiveness energizes you. The key is to develop three overlapping domains of rugged flexibility: mindset, identity, and action.

• Mindset: Developing a perspective that accepts impermanence and expects difficulty instead of fearing it.
• Identity: Building a self that is cohesive but fluid—stable enough to feel like ‘you,’ yet flexible enough to grow.
• Actions: Learning to respond, not react, during moments of change, and to turn adversity into meaning and momentum.

These three aspects work together: mindset shapes identity, identity drives actions, and actions reinforce mindset. When integrated, they form a coherent framework for sustainable excellence—doing good and feeling good over the long haul.

A Path, Not a Road

Stulberg closes his introduction with a vivid metaphor. A road, he writes, is linear and rigid—it has a set destination, cutting straight through the landscape. When conditions shift, roads crack. A path, on the other hand, winds with its environment; it reveals itself step by step. On a path, you’re not “knocked off course” because the course itself evolves. The lesson is clear: treat your life as a path, not a road. If you cling to the illusion of fixed order, you’ll crumble when chaos arrives. But if you embrace change as part of the terrain, you’ll endure and even flourish.

To guide readers along this path, Stulberg divides the book into three parts: cultivating a rugged and flexible mindset, building a rugged and flexible identity, and performing rugged and flexible actions. Each section offers stories, science, and tools for mastering change, from the micro (daily frustrations, injuries, career shifts) to the macro (collective upheavals, aging, mortality).

This insight reframes reality itself: flux is not an emergency; it’s the essence of being alive. Master of Change is as much a psychological manual as a philosophical meditation—a call to evolve your relationship with impermanence so that you can live, work, love, and lead with purpose even when nothing stays the same.

Across the following key ideas, we’ll unpack Stulberg’s core techniques—from opening to life’s flow and expecting it to be hard, to redefining identity and taking wise action. His framework doesn’t eliminate uncertainty—it transforms how you meet it, turning chaos into a lifelong teacher rather than a foe.

Change is unsettling because your brain equates stability with safety. But as Brad Stulberg reveals in the story of climber Tommy Caldwell, the antidote to fear isn’t more control—it’s acceptance. Caldwell’s journey from trauma to triumph illustrates that true strength arises when you open yourself to life’s flow, not when you fight it.

Facing Disorder: A Climber’s Awakening

In his twenties, professional climber Tommy Caldwell was kidnapped by militants in Kyrgyzstan and forced to kill one of his captors to survive. Returning home, he spiraled into guilt and alienation. When he later lost a finger in a woodworking accident, it seemed his climbing career—and identity—were over. Yet instead of resisting reality, he decided to adapt. As he said, “Pain is growth.” That mindset transformed his loss into mastery: years later, Caldwell became the first person to free climb Yosemite’s Dawn Wall, one of the hardest climbs on Earth.

Caldwell’s story captures the essence of rugged flexibility—recognizing when resistance becomes imprisonment. His transformation wasn’t about erasing pain but reframing it as a natural part of change, a concept mirrored in Stoicism, Buddhism, and Taoism, all of which teach that attachment fuels suffering.

From “Having” to “Being”

Drawing on psychologist Erich Fromm’s classic distinction in To Have or To Be?, Stulberg argues that meaning emerges when you shift from defining yourself by what you have (roles, possessions, successes) to who you are in essence—your being mode. A having mindset is fragile because anything you have can be lost. A being mindset, by contrast, roots you in values and presence, which endure even amid chaos. Caldwell stopped having a finger and a perfect plan—and started being a person who responds with creativity and courage. Likewise, Stulberg’s coaching client Christine rediscovered her calling as a writer after losing her job during COVID, proving that when “having” falls apart, “being” begins.

The Inescapability Trigger

One of Stulberg’s most practical insights comes from behavioral scientist Daniel Gilbert: acceptance begins when you realize there’s no way out. This inescapability trigger turns powerlessness into clarity. When you stop wasting energy fantasizing about alternate realities—like Caldwell longing for his finger back or Christine wishing COVID would end—you free up energy to act. Denial sustains torment; acceptance releases it.

Impermanence as Gift

Stulberg draws on Freud’s essay “On Transience,” which argues that fleetingness enhances beauty: “A flower that blossoms only for a single night does not seem to us less lovely.” Life’s meaning is intensified by its impermanence—the “ten thousand joys and ten thousand sorrows” of being human. Caldwell’s victory on the Dawn Wall encapsulates this truth: the exhilaration of success exists precisely because it could not last forever. Like Caldwell, you can learn to treasure experiences not in spite of their passing but because of it.

To open to the flow of life, Stulberg urges you to embrace non-dual thinking—not this or that, but this and that. Life is both stable and unstable, beautiful and painful, fleeting and eternal. By loosening your grip on certainty, you become strong enough to meet change without losing yourself. This is the first principle of mastering change: stop damming the river. Let it flow, and learn to move with it.

Once you accept that change is constant, the next step is to face it clear-eyed: not every challenge will be easy, and expecting otherwise only multiplies suffering. Drawing on neuroscience, philosophy, and Viktor Frankl’s concept of tragic optimism, Brad Stulberg shows how calibrated expectations can turn pain into resilience.

Reality Minus Expectation = Happiness

In a simple but powerful equation, Stulberg reminds us that happiness equals reality minus expectations. When your expectations exceed reality, disappointment expands. Instead of insisting that life should always feel good, he encourages embracing realism. Studies from Denmark reveal that lower, grounded expectations often lead to higher satisfaction; people who anticipate adversity adapt faster and suffer less when it arrives.

The Brain Is a Prediction Machine

Neuroscience research by Andy Clark and others supports this: your brain constantly predicts what’s next and adjusts to deviations. When expectations and reality diverge sharply, your body releases stress hormones to realign. That’s why the Delta variant of COVID-19 felt so crushing—after expecting the pandemic to end, another wave shattered our predictions. Physiologically, our brains experienced a kind of cognitive whiplash.

By expecting difficulty, you align your internal forecasts with reality, minimizing distress. Soldiers anticipate battlefield injuries differently than civilians do, not because they lack fear but because they calibrate for possibility. Expecting hardship doesn’t invite pessimism—it reduces shock.

Tragic Optimism: Hope Without Illusion

Stulberg draws heavily on Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl’s idea of tragic optimism—the ability to remain hopeful and find meaning despite unavoidable suffering. It’s not blind optimism but acceptance with courage. Stulberg also profiles Serge Hollerbach, a painter who lost his vision late in life yet reinvented his craft by relying on his “inner eye.” His blindness wasn’t a blessing, but it became a starting point for new expression. Hollerbach embodies tragic optimism: recognizing tragedy without surrendering purpose.

Rather than seeing pain as inherently bad, tragic optimism reframes it as information: proof that you still care, that you’re alive enough to feel. In practice, this means you stop asking “Why me?” and start asking “What now?”

Wise Hope and Wise Action

From Buddhist philosophy, Stulberg borrows the idea of dukkha: life is full of things hard to face, not necessarily suffering itself. Some respond with denial, others with despair. The third path is what he calls wise hope—the middle ground between naive positivity and cynical defeat. It asks you to accept uncertainty while still doing the next right thing. Civil rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson, for instance, confronts systemic injustice daily but never abandons compassion or effort. His mantra—“get proximate”—captures tragic optimism in action.

Ultimately, the practice of expecting difficulty rewires both body and mind. When you view struggle as part of the terrain rather than an error in the map, you conserve energy, stay kind to yourself, and move forward with rugged resilience. Hard seasons will always come—but if you anticipate them as inevitable companions on your path, they lose their power to paralyze you.

Rigid identities crumble under the pressure of change. A person who defines themselves solely as a careerist, athlete, or parent risks collapse when those roles shift. Brad Stulberg’s antidote is to cultivate a fluid sense of self—staying firmly rooted in values while allowing identity to evolve. Like water adapting to its container, you maintain continuity without rigidity.

The Athlete Who Became Human Again

Stulberg opens with Swedish Olympic skater Nils van der Poel, who defied elite-sport convention by living like a normal person during training—drinking beer, skiing with friends, reading philosophy. Instead of burning out, he found balance and joy. By stepping beyond his sport, he paradoxically became a better skater. “There was no longer anything to fear,” he wrote. His story shows that anchoring solely to one pursuit breeds fragility; diversifying emotion and meaning builds durability.

Complexity: Differentiation + Integration

Borrowing from ecology and systems theory, Stulberg defines robust identity as a combination of differentiation (having distinct life domains—family, career, creativity, service) and integration (connecting them into a coherent whole). The more parts you nurture, the more options you have when one part changes. Comedian Fortune Feimster’s mother, Ginger, exemplifies this when she embraces her daughter’s sexuality while retaining her Southern Christian faith. By integrating love, faith, and openness, she expanded her identity without losing herself.

Independent and Interdependent Selves

Western culture glorifies individuality, but Stulberg—drawing on research from psychologists Hazel Markus and Alana Conner—shows that healthy identity weaves both independence and interdependence. You are both a self and part of an environment. Ecuadorian musician Nicola Cruz embodies this balance: his electronica fuses ancestral Andean rhythms with modern beats, blending self-expression with cultural roots. The goal is not to choose between independence or dependence but to move fluidly between them depending on the context.

Ego Flexibility and the “Ultimate Self”

Psychologist Jane Loevinger described ego development as a lifelong unfolding. Early on, you need strength and boundaries to survive; later, that same ego must learn to soften. Similarly, the Buddhist story of the wanderer Vacchagotta captures this tension: asked whether the self exists, the Buddha stays silent. His point? Both a personal (conventional) self and a universal (ultimate) self exist. You are distinct and continuous, yet also changing and interwoven with everything around you. Non-dual acceptance of this paradox fosters maturity and peace.

To cultivate a fluid sense of self, Stulberg urges you to diversify who you are, integrate your parts, stay anchored to values rather than labels, and practice seeing yourself as both independent and interdependent. Fluid identity is freedom—it allows you to flow through life’s transitions without fracturing, letting each reorder evolve you into a sturdier, kinder, more complex you.

Fluidity without structure turns to chaos. After helping you loosen the grip on identity, Stulberg reminds you that even rivers need banks. Developing rugged and flexible boundaries means grounding yourself in core values—the constants that guide you through confusion, loss, or renewal.

Core Values: The Anchor in the Storm

Core values are the qualities that define how you want to live—integrity, creativity, presence, love. Stulberg advises choosing three to five, defining them clearly, and translating each into action. When change hits, ask: “How can I move toward my values right now?” or “How can I protect them?” This approach stabilizes the self without fossilizing it. In neuroscientist Emily Falk’s experiments, people who reflected on core values before facing threats showed stronger activity in reward centers—their brains literally saw disruption as manageable challenge rather than catastrophe.

Flexibility in Practice: Federer, Penzias, and Wilson

Adaptation doesn’t mean abandoning your principles; it means applying them differently as conditions change. Tennis legend Roger Federer exemplifies this: when age slowed him, he didn’t cling to youth’s methods. He trained less, recovered more, revised his backhand, and switched rackets while holding onto his core values—excellence, mastery, love of the game. Similarly, physicists Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson discovered cosmic microwave background radiation only because they had the humility to question bias and stay loyal to their scientific integrity, even when evidence challenged their own beliefs.

Values at Scale: The New York Times

Organizations, too, survive upheaval by balancing ruggedness and flexibility. While most newspapers collapsed under digital disruption, The New York Times flourished by keeping its values—independence, curiosity, truth—constant while reinventing formats through podcasts, paywalls, and new storytelling media. As editor Dean Baquet put it, “A lot of stuff we think is core is just habit.” His team learned to preserve purpose but shed rigidity—a lesson individuals can apply to personal growth.

Flexibility, then, is not weakness; it’s strategic evolution. Philosopher Thomas Kuhn famously said scientific revolutions depend on “shared values” to navigate crises. Likewise, your personal evolution depends on using values as a compass, not a cage.

To apply this: identify your rugged core values, practice them flexibly, and remember that early plasticity leads to later resilience. Values-driven action, especially during disorder, doesn’t just stabilize you—it shapes who you become next.

When change hits, your body wants to panic, fight, or freeze. Rugged flexibility means doing the opposite—pausing to respond intentionally. Drawing from Stoicism, neuroscience, and martial arts, Stulberg shows that response is mastery; reaction is survival mode.

The Stoic and the Samurai

Two ancient wisdom traditions converge here. The Stoic philosopher Epictetus wrote, “Some things are in our power, others are not.” The Taoist sage Lao Tzu said, “The master allows things to happen; she shapes them as they come.” Both teach that agency lies in how you respond, not what happens. The Christian serenity prayer echoes this, reminding us to distinguish what can and cannot be changed.

During COVID, fourth-grade teacher Katie exemplified this principle. When her school went remote, she lost structure overnight. Instead of raging at chaos, she refocused on her values—service and care for her students. She created mental-health check-ins, opened windows stuck shut, taught hybrid classes with calm improvisation. She “became the rock in the storm,” Stulberg writes, by repeatedly focusing on what she could control: her response.

Zanshin: Continuous Awareness

Aikido martial artists call this zanshin—a relaxed, alert awareness that perceives both the target and the field around it. Golf champion Inbee Park embodies zanshin on the green; her extraordinary putting accuracy stems from focusing on form, not outcome. Similarly, zanshin in daily life means seeing challenges as part of a larger landscape rather than fixating on narrow goals. As aikido teacher George Leonard wrote, “The quality of your zanshin is the quality of your life.”

From RAGE to SEEKING

Neuroscience reveals why reaction is so hard to override. The amygdala triggers the RAGE circuit—primal fight-or-flight energy. The opposing SEEKING pathway, driven by dopamine, activates when we make plans or take deliberate action. The two can’t operate simultaneously. By choosing small, values-driven steps—what psychologists call behavioral activation—you strengthen the SEEKING pathway and weaken the RAGE one. Over time, responding becomes your default, not reacting.

The 4Ps: Pause, Process, Plan, Proceed

To operationalize responding, Stulberg teaches the 4Ps method. Pause: stop and name your emotion (research shows labeling reduces amygdala activity). Process: recognize what’s really happening and give emotions space. Plan: use perspective-taking—what advice would your future self or a wise friend give? Proceed: act on the best available response and treat it as an experiment. This simple but profound sequence turns chaos into clarity.

Rugged flexibility requires mastering this art of deliberate response. In a reactive world fueled by outrage and noise, your calm attention becomes a profound act of resistance. Over time, those who respond—not react—are the ones who endure change without being consumed by it.

What happens when, despite all your efforts, life still knocks you flat? In the final section, Stulberg reveals that sometimes the most courageous act isn’t rapid recovery—it’s patient persistence. Meaning and growth arise on their own schedule, he argues, through surrender, humility, community, and compassion.

When Meaning Can’t Be Forced

After enduring his own battle with obsessive-compulsive disorder, Stulberg realized that trying to “find the lesson” too soon deepened his suffering. Therapist James Hollis calls these experiences “the rooms in our psychic mansion”—spaces we can’t just fix or reframe. Like the immune system fighting infection, your psychological immune system needs time to integrate trauma. Forcing growth prematurely can feel hollow; real transformation unfolds slowly, like scar tissue forming strength.

Surrender and Asking for Help

Rather than control the uncontrollable, Stulberg advocates for surrender—not giving up, but easing the grip. Psychiatrist Anna Lembke calls this the “spiritual pivot,” when you stop trying to fix everything and open to guidance, whether from community, therapy, or faith. Neuroscientist Judson Brewer finds that surrender calms overactivity in the self-obsessed posterior cingulate cortex, helping you “get out of your own way.” And as Peter Sterling’s allostasis model shows, resilience often depends on borrowing resources: asking for and receiving help while your capacity expands.

Simplify, Rest, and Reengage

During deep disorder, simplicity is sanity. Research by Leidy Klotz shows humans instinctively add complexity to problems instead of subtracting it. Stulberg prescribes voluntary simplicity: pare life down to essentials, lean on routines, and find rituals that ground you—a morning walk, shared meal, or meditation practice. He also distinguishes real fatigue (needing rest) from fake fatigue (boredom or inertia). The trick is to listen wisely: rest when you truly can’t, but nudge yourself into action when apathy lingers too long.

From Pain to Compassion

In the Buddhist teaching “no mud, no lotus,” Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us that beauty grows from suffering. Stulberg echoes this through stories like Nora McInerny, who turned grief into solidarity by building communities for the bereaved, and Jay Ashman, a reformed neo-Nazi who now educates others against hate. Suffering, he writes, can soften the ego and enlarge empathy. It’s through pain that we become kinder.

The final message of Master of Change is hopeful but sober: hard times will always be hard, but with each cycle of order, disorder, and reorder, we become slightly wiser and more compassionate. You can’t fast-forward meaning, but if you keep showing up—with humility, community, and care—you’ll find that pain eventually metamorphoses into purpose.