Change Is Constant

Take Thanksgiving for example. This year my sister-in-law had some family members down from New York that joined us for dinner. They made some new (to us) dishes that were absolutely delicious … but our senior family members wouldn’t try them.

Years ago, the first Thanksgiving that we hosted, my mom and aunt brought THEIR OWN plates of dry, weirdly cut turkey (a plate each!) to dinner because a) they didn’t trust that my husband would do it right, and b) they didn’t like how he carved the turkey.

Here’s the thing … change is absolutely inevitable. It is a part of life. We, those around us, the entire world around us is literally changing every single moment. Fighting that change is not only fruitless, but frustrating, maddening, depressing, fear inducing, on and on.

For me, even though my first gut instinct with every change or new experience in my life is to resist, I’ve found that the faster I embrace it, and pour my focus into that change and moving forward, the better. This quote made me think of that immediately. Now, even though it’s still scary, when I am faced with a change I dive in fully and completely and don’t look back. (I’ll admit that I am often a work in progress on this still.)

What I’ve learned through this is that all of my fear and angst surrounding a change or new experience is purely anticipatory … What if this happens? What if that happens? What will I do? What if it’s bad? …

BUT … What if it’s good? What if it’s fun? What if it’s the best thing that ever happened to me? I’ve found that by focusing on the latter, by focusing on building the new, on creating the new routine (which soothes my anxiety) every change, every bit of newness, has opened a new door, a new window, a new way of thinking and doing for me, which has always been good … even if the change wasn’t my choice in the beginning.

How do you cope with change in your life?