| There
are those of us who find change to be a wonderfully
invigorating experience, and those of us who find change
to be terrifying. Since I belong to the first group, I
find it hard to understand those who belong to the second
group, but I recognize that as my shortcoming, not theirs.
I like change because I'm used to change, and because I've
gone through change regularly. I know how positive it can
be because I've experienced it, and I've seen the results
of change. I know that even the changes that seem to be
very negative end up being positive--how many people who
have been laid off have found even better jobs doing work
they love doing, though they never would have done so--never
would have changed--if they hadn't been forced to?
A
wonderful friend now lives a couple of thousand miles
away because her husband was laid off and found work
elsewhere--but they love where they are and what they're
doing. It's the same for another friend who's a few hundred miles
away now--she loves her new job and her new life.
Change terrifies because the status quo is usually
comfortable. We can pay the bills and keep food on the
table the way things are, so why change anything? That's
one way the military gets people to re-up: focus on the
pleasantness of the secure, steady income, and remind
people of the risks of getting out into the real world. But change shouldn't be terrifying if we trust life and
trust God. Life goes on no matter what happens to us
individually, and it's always rife with opportunity and
possibility, yet somehow we focus on the limitations and
impossibilities. If our lives change, then we have to
examine the change and search out the positive in it,
search out the potential in it.
Having
grown up in a family with a father in the military, we
were forced to change our entire lives regularly, and it
never hurt us. We learned a lot from the change, and
though there are times when I wish I had some roots
somewhere, someplace I could call home, I know that what
I learned about myself and others from having gone
through so much change is invaluable in my life. The
change sometimes wounded us, and we missed out on long-term
friendships and relationships, but it never killed us,
and we always got something from it.
Change
is not without its dark side, of course. Change is inevitable, and it seems to have become much
more common in our culture. We change jobs, homes,
families, spouses, cars, everything much more often and
readily than we used to, and many people use change to avoid facing
problems that are extremely important parts of their
lives. The people who give up on their marriages without
making a true effort to work through the problems are causing
more problems than they're solving -- running away from
problems is not true change, but avoidance. These people
are not growing through change, but trying to use change to
help them to avoid potentially difficult effort and
soul-searching.
Most
change is very positive, if we look at it in a healthy way,
yet there are still many who
balk at change, and who allow the possibility of change
to terrify them, to take away their lust for living, to
make them back away from life. Change and risk go hand in
hand, and the life without risk can not be a full life,
for human beings are by nature dynamic and full of life
and energy. Let change happen, go with it, move with it,
learn from it. Don't let it pull you down or make you
feel afraid. Trust life and trust God that the change
will be for the best, then look for the best--don't
expect it to announce itself to you. |
