Is Change Always Good?

Photo by Tulen Travel on Unsplash

I remember being in graduate school, listening to a group of teachers talk about change.  “You can’t be afraid of change,” they all agreed, nodding.  “Change is inevitable.”

Perhaps.  But the fact that something is inevitable doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a healthy fear of it.  After all, tornadoes, earthquakes, and forest fires cause pretty big changes, don’t they?

Of course, the teachers weren’t talking about forces of nature.  They were talking about shifts in educational trends.  Still, the idea that we must all embrace change is one that most of us encounter in our lives.  Personally, I have a had a hard time with change.  I remember, when I was very little, my dad shaved his beard.  I was so upset I didn’t want to talk to him.  And my mom still tells me how mad she would get whenever she changed the furniture around in the living room.

I’ve gotten a lot better (I had a reader ask recently if Ginny Moon was really a thinly veiled version of me because I said that change can be difficult), but I’m always a little rattled when someone I’m close to changes.  Because when a person changes, my relationship with him or her changes as well – and really, that means I have to change too.  I have to evolve.

I haven’t thought about it a lot yet (I will soon, though – see below), but I suspect that the changes we experience because of how other people change present us with much greater challenges than the ones that occur more naturally, in our own hearts.

Our own hearts?  Sometimes I wonder if there even is such a thing.  An awful lot of people seem to have a share in mine.

In the next few weeks I’m going to be thinking and writing about some changes – specifically, how my own beliefs changed as a result of changes in other people.  I’ll write about why I stopped eating meat, and my transition from teacher to writer.  About going to Bee School.  Social media.  And finally, about one of my best friends, who found his calling when the right technology was invented.

I’m wondering, though – what do you think about the changes you’ve undergone because of a change in someone else?