I think I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with change. I love it when it’s easy and by choice and I hate it when it’s painful and shows up without warning. There seems to be a magical enticing that beckons us when we approach the chasm of change. Perhaps the magic lies in the CHOICE that is before you.
You don’t have to choose to engage.
You can turn around and run right back to the path you were already on if you prefer. Or you can let change have its beautiful way and find out what awaits you on the other side.
Like most juicy romances, we lose our senses for a while and get engulfed in the positive moments and yet intertwined in the positive lies the patterns we ignored and if we listen closely enough we hear whispers reminding us of how change showed up for us in the past. We panic, the magic dissipates. Before the change can get started, we get cold feet and wonder if it is really going to be worth all the effort. We sabotage ourselves with the thought: “This will eventually end badly so why bother?” and “Let’s save the energy this time around and sit this one out.”
I’ve been through many changes.
Some good, some bad, some neutral. Each time a new one is headed my way I have the tendency to recoil. I brace myself and then retreat into my deep dark cave where I sit comfy and familiarly and lament until I decide what side of the change I am going to come out on. Some of us conquer our goals and dreams early in life. We know exactly what we want and we go for it. Others, like me, wake up and realize halfway through the game that life is passing you by and you better sober up and make things happen. Though a late bloomer, I’ve accomplished many things. I have metamorphosed through many seasons of change.
Change changes you.
No enlightenment there. But do we really understand just how much change changes us? Without change, nothing changes. Without change, we can’t grow. Pain and Simple. Pun intended.
My most current change is the painful catch you off guard type of change. I’m no rookie here and I have had plenty of training yet I still find myself kicking and screaming.
Like a caterpillar kickboxing her way out of the cocoon. I want out but I am also scared as hell of what awaits me. The fear is not because I don’t think that eventually, I can figure it out but primarily because I assume that I know just how painful and long-suffering the “figure it out” part is going to be.
Or do I?
Perhaps I am only looking back at my past romances with change and only extracting from them those painful and never-ending moments. Maybe I’m choosing which parts I want to remember and hold grudges in my mind.
My relationship with change is about to once again… change. I welcome that with open arms. I think. While I have done my “work” over time, I have also had a shit ton of distractions along my way. In my darkest moments of intense change, I still had to perform because other people depended on me to do so. This was beneficial but also it delayed me from ever intimately going through change with eyes wide open. The distractions delayed me from giving complete attention to the stuff in my life that needed to change. I was delayed from fully addressing what wasn’t working for me because I was always dealing with the busyness before me.
In my past relationships with change, I definitely acquired skills but there weren’t many thrills. Not that I am a thrill seeker. Well maybe I am but that’s another story. There is the thrill of being completely present in the now that I have yet to discover. The thrill of approaching change with a heart of discovery and awe. I’m a newbie to this unfamiliar scene.
My youngest child is headed to Paris Island in a few months. Aside from a million other changes this one event evokes, for the first time in my life, I will be on my own. I will be primarily responsible for myself and let me tell you- at times I overwhelm myself! I’m scared and I am also excited.
I have lived long enough to know that my life can stay exactly the same if I do nothing. If I take the road of ease and breeze I will be writing a blog ten years from now talking about the same old same old.
I’d be still kickboxing my way out of the cocoon.
Or I can pause right here and sit with it.
I could “have tea with it” as my dear friend and coach Kate Pintor would say. And from this new and unfamiliar place, I can start looking for the next clues that are about to emerge. I can remind the fears that this is new and we are new. I can follow each change up with new discernment because I am not the same person today as I was the last time change came knocking at my door. I can embrace the unknown and emerge from the cocoon with grace and childlike anticipation or not. The choice is mine and so are the results.
Change.
It’s a beautifully painful thing but well worth the journey. Life’s a trip and you don’t have to do it alone. I’m here if you need help with the changes before you.