Change (Jan 10, 2022)

Change. It sometimes sneaks up on us. It sometimes blows the roof off. But mostly, change is a silent companion in our lives, inexorably moving from moment to moment, fall to winter, summer to monsoon, birthing to dying.

Change is really, truly inevitable.

But HOW we relate to change (which, for a significant chunk of modern humanity, is through a terrified, bordering on rabid, resistance) is NOT.

Our relationship to change doesn’t have to be a rigid binary, contrary to what we are often taught today. It does not have to be a relationship of trapped, desperate rejection or maniacal embrace, of deathly silence or exuberant heroism, of scared mice or roaring lion.

We have a choice in changing our relationship to change, to explore our resistance to change with a teeny bit less fear, a tiny bit more courage, and a dash of curiosity to spice it all up.

A new relationship with change can be guided by gentle curiousity that slowly chips away at the training most of us have received–to approach it with a knee-jerk, terrified, mindless rejection. A new relationship with change can draw on the quiet bravery and daily practice of taking one, tiny step, and another, and another in doing something new despite our terror. Then, perhaps, one-and-a-half steps. And then, perhaps, two.

Changing how we relate to change starts with curiosity, with doing something, one thing, differently simply to see what (if anything) happens. And with repetition, with doing it over and over until the doing has seeped into our very beings, leading to intimate knowledge about ourselves, and how we show up (or not) in our own life journeys.

Change is inevitable, unrelenting, and completely beyond our control. But our relationship with change as we navigate this one life — as hapless bystanders or fully engaged dance partners — that is a choice. There is nothing inevitable about that.