Change can be such a pain!
Don’t get me wrong; I love an adventure, a new address and a fresh circumstance
as much as the next person, but the actual change is not easy. As Isaac Asimov
said, “Life is pleasant, death is
peaceful, it’s only the transition that’s troublesome.”
Maybe this is the real reason I don’t like change, because I don’t really know how to transition. It sounds common sense but I’m still learning that to change I have to actually leave the old before I can appropriately embrace the new. Every change in life requires this. When I got married I had to say goodbye to my bachelor life to properly welcome married life. As long as the bachelor Collin lived, the married Collin would not have a happy existence. Both Collins could not remain, one had to go. When Claire and I first had Grace it took us a while to transition from our old to our new way of life. Our old life had to die before we could receive parenthood with joy.
Maybe this is the real reason I don’t like change, because I don’t really know how to transition. It sounds common sense but I’m still learning that to change I have to actually leave the old before I can appropriately embrace the new. Every change in life requires this. When I got married I had to say goodbye to my bachelor life to properly welcome married life. As long as the bachelor Collin lived, the married Collin would not have a happy existence. Both Collins could not remain, one had to go. When Claire and I first had Grace it took us a while to transition from our old to our new way of life. Our old life had to die before we could receive parenthood with joy.
God forever compels me to change, to
commit to a new way of being, but I put off the change I resist the transition
and this is the most unhappy existence. I come across so many angry and
restless people who live this painful reality; torn between being called to the
new but too afraid, too unsure, and not ready to let go of the old.
How much time and energy we
waste fighting for things that just aren’t any more, battling for the way
things used to be. God’s wonderful promise is to turn every end into a
transition to new life, relentlessly turning every dead-end into a new-beginning.
But we must make the difficult choice, we must accept that new
beginning for it to ever be a beginning at all.
At this time of year nature
looks at its worst all hopeless and dead; if you look closely buds are
emerging, the air is warming and something wonderful is about to happen. But
for spring to come nature must let go of winter.
Maybe a change, even a tough one, will do me good.
Anyone who holds onto life
just as it is, destroys that life. But the one who reckless in their love, lets
it go, will have life, real and eternal.
John 12:25MSG
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