You Need To Stop Thinking Change Is A Bad Thing

Change is inevitable. You’ve heard that phrase before, right? The idea that who we are, that where we are, that what is happening all around us is all a part of this big cycle/mess/chaos/flow of life. And it’s forever shifting.

We’re told as children that we’re going to grow up.
We’re told in puberty that our bodies are drastically adjusting.
We’re told that life will take so many turns and twists.

And we’re told that we need not cling to the familiar, because everything will forever be becoming new.

Sometimes that’s really frustrating.
Sometimes that’s really scary.

Sometimes we just want things to stay as they are, right in the middle of perfection, where our mouths are curved upwards into smiles and we feel settled and comfortable and safe and good.

But life doesn’t work like that.
And just when you think you have it all figured out, life switches up on you.

But change is not a bad thing.

Change is synonymous with growth, with second chances, with new beginnings, with do-overs and exciting starts. Change means somewhere strange and unfamiliar and vastly different than before.

But it doesn’t mean bad.

I think we fear change because we’re scared of who we will become when everything has shifted around us, when we don’t recognize those closest to us, or even our own faces in the mirror. We’re scared of change because change can mean we’re pushed in directions we’re hesitant to go, or that we might lose the ones we love somewhere in the process.

Change is scary because we don’t know what lies ahead, and standing on the edge, leaning forward makes it seem like a huge, uninviting drop-off between where we are and where we are supposed to go.

But change isn’t like that, at least not all the time. Sometimes change can be awful, yes. But mostly change is awful in the beginning because you’re not used to it, and once you settle in, you discover it’s not so bad after all.

Change leads you to places, to people, to opportunities, to a life you never pictured. It shows you ways that your life can be different from the one you had before; it shows you what kind of person you are, one that is even stronger than you thought.

Change isn’t a bad thing. It’s a opportunity.

It’s the world granting you a gift, allowing you to open your wings and to fly. Sure, you won’t soar at first. Sure, you might stumble or crash to the ground a few times as you learn how to flap your wings and be carried by the wind.

But then you will take flight.

And you’ll see the world on the ground mirroring those fears back to you, tiny and insignificant as ants from this height.