Days 44, 45, and 46.

Yikes! Losing track of days (anyone else?)–excuse the audio. This post reflects days 44, 45, and 46. Apparently I’ve lived day 43 twice?

“What if I told you that 10 years from now, your life would be exactly the same? I doubt you’d be happy. So, why are you so afraid of change?” – Karen Salmansohn

When you read that quote, did you immediately tense up? Or did you laugh? Maybe you fell somewhere in the middle? There is so much to unwrap within those three simply sentiments.

Maybe you immediately thought about how content you are with your life. Maybe you thought, hell, if I’m here in ten years, that’s not so bad. Is that true though? I am not suggesting that you are not really happy with your life. I am suggesting that true sameness is different than mostly the same. What? I know.

You may work for the same company in ten years. However, your job may be different than it is today. Even if your role is exactly the same, there will likely be shifts in how you do your job. These shifts occur organically as a result of the world changing. The changing of time brings us new technologies and other efficiencies. Companies naturally shift their product and service offerings as supply and demand morphs over time. Sometimes age alone will a necessitate a job change. Perhaps your job is wholly or mostly physical. Even someone in the best shape will need to modify the way in which they work based on the body’s aging process. So yeah, change typically comes whether we want it to or not.

What about your relationships? You might be married to the same person or living with the same person or seeing the same person or you may still be alone. I don’t think it will come as any shock to you that even if you are single, your relationship with yourself will change over time. As time passes and we learn (or resist learning), our perspective shifts. Our needs and wants change. Our feelings of self-worth change. Relationships with other humans unquestionably change over time for so many reasons. Life takes us on, we encounter challenges we might not have expected, we grow together, we grow apart.

Maybe I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. Life + time = change. So, if change is inevitable, why are we so fearful of it? Why do we remain in situations that are unhealthy simply because we fear the change that is going to happen regardless? Here is another little tidbit that I am sure you know but maybe bears mentioning in simplistic terms: when we proactively shift our paradigm, we are exerting some modicum of control. We often have no ability to control those changes that occur as a result of external forces.

Okay, so maybe your brain has tricked you into believing that you can prevent change from occurring if you try hard enough or that either way, it feels better to delay the inevitable?

As to the first point, I am here to tell you (and maybe burst your bubble) that no amount of force of will exerted from your seat is going to stop change. It may appear as though you’ve ben effective in your campaign. You may still be in the same relationship or at the same job, but the wheels of change are churning and turning under your feet and you WILL see the impact of such in one way or another. You might grow distant from your partner or you might fight more often. You might be the subject of infidelity or find yourself seeking the company of someone new. You might be treated differently at work, even to the extent where you feel marginalized. You may see yourself differently. Change. Is. Inevitable.

Okay, so with that out of the way, maybe you are just happy to delay the anticipated feeling of sadness or unsatisfaction as long as possible. You recognize that your relationship is going to end or your job is going to be lost or materially altered, but you are willing to do nearly anything to kick the proverbial can down the road. I get it. Let’s start with that. I truly understand. That was my life and those were my feelings for a really long time. I saw that things were sort of crumbling or messy all around me, but I felt content to let them stay that way as long as I could. Here’s the thing, and you probably already know what I’m going to say, I made it SO much worse for myself. Instead of taking the reins and trying to do something meaningful with the changes I needed to make, I let the universe make those changes for me. When the change was completely outside of any bit of my control, it felt fucking awful. I didn’t look back and thank myself for pushing things off until ____. I was pissed at myself. I was frustrated. Things were so much worse than they might have been or could have been. Mostly because I was in a worse spot. I didn’t carpe the diem while I was postponing the unavoidable. I lived in fear and anxiety. I knew the universe was going to auto-correct in the most spectacular fashion and that weighed on me, heavily. It was really terrible. So, I ask you again, why? Why do we do this to ourselves?

Well because change is so goddamn scary. Even if we are unhappy with our lives and want to see big changes in ten years, we are still afraid of change. We are mostly creatures of habit. Even if we like variety and the new and the refreshing, we like it in small doses. We like new assignments and new restaurants to try. We don’t like the ending of relationships or the major change to job responsibilities or function. There is a scale of change and most of us, most of the time, fall on the lower end of that scale. Give me change universe, but make it palatable. Make it something that I can brag about or even complain about, not something that sends me into a downward spiral. Does that sound familiar? I have zero shame telling you that’s basically been my inner voice dialogue for a good part of my life.

So much fear. So willing to hang onto anything with the thought that anything is better than the alternative.

Sometimes the ‘other’ does suck and often it takes some getting used to. Here’s what I know for sure, once you get through the yucky bits and the discomfort, it feels so much better. That anxiety or what might befall you is gone. It’s happened and you are on the other side of it all. With change comes opportunity. Every. Single. Time. It might take time to reveal itself, but it will come. The ending of a relationship leaves room to cultivate a new relationship with yourself or open your heart to something or someone new. The ending of a job can force you to prioritize, it can give you a greater appreciation, and it might even force you to explore doing something different for a living. I am NOT belittling how terrifying and terrible it is to lose a relationship or your job. Not even a smidgen. It’s beyond awful on every level.

We cannot still the wheels of change but we CAN play a role in how we approach that change. We can make choices that help us react to that change in a way that is more beneficial and less harmful. We can learn to have a better relationship with change. Like everything else, I recommend baby steps. Change something that feels more palatable. Get a different brand of milk. Sounds silly, but small is the place to start.

Once you get accustomed to the idea of change, you’ll be surprised at how much change you’ll be able to stomach. God speed.

Talk to you tomorrow.

L.