“I changed but he/she didn’t.”
Far too often those are the words uttered when people find themselves at impasses in their relationships. One changed, grew, and developed and the other one stayed the same.
Whether we like it or not – life is a journey. And anytime we are going on a journey, things are never the EXACT SAME OR we would never get anywhere.
Think about it – – – when you go on a trip, every mile you take brings about different scenery. And if we travel far enough – eventually we encounter different terrain, climate, and overall surroundings. Nothing stays the same.
The same is true in life.
We can’t help BUT to change.Each day we live, each challenge we face in either our personal or professional lives, each joy we celebrate – all of those things have potential to change us. Sometimes the problem is we are not aware of the changes. Or other times we fight against the change.
There are some problems that come when we shy away from change, as cited from 13 Things Mentally Strong People Do by Amy Morin,
- Staying the same often means we get stuck in a rut. When we aren’t open to change, we often miss out on richness in life we aren’t aware of.
- We miss out on learning new things. The bottom line is the world is going to change without us changing. It will change whether we like it or not. If we keep doing thigns the same way for the rest of our lives, we will be left behind.
- We can’t make our lives better if we don’t change. Many of our problems require us to do something different.
- We won’t develop healthier lifestyles.
- Other people will outgrow us.
- The longer we wait, the harder it gets! The perfect time to do things often never comes! And the longer we delay change, the harder it is to do.
One of West’s core values is that we will always be “infinitely changing.” More than anything, that was created to protect the church. Because while now people may embrace continuous change, that may not always be true. When we created the core values, leadership recognized that it could really hurt us if we didn’t see the need to always be willing to embrace change.
That is true in our lives as well.
What personal situations in your life could be richer and stronger if you would embrace change?
Ecclesiastes 3:1
1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: