I had a chemistry teacher in high school who once said to the class: Change is the only constant. At the time, that phrase meant next to nothing to me, since chemistry was never my most shining subject, and most of the material went in one ear and out the other. The phrase itself derived from the infamous philosopher, Heraclitus who clearly exemplified an owl-like wisdom. However, just like the periodic table, that phrase escaped my mind until a few months back when it magically reappeared out of thin air.

Change is the only constant...

Stop and think about it for a second, EVERYTHING WILL CHANGE. You will not wake up the same person tomorrow, you will be one day older, possibly one day wiser. You will have had experiences and encounters today that shape how you greet the day tomorrow. You will feel differently about the people who surround you, maybe you'll decide you no longer need them in your life, or maybe you'll have discovered a deeper appreciation for what they add to it. The weather will change, the leaves that once hung delicately from the branches will eventually fall and cover the ground you walk on. Change is certain. Circumstances will change, time will change, people will change.

That last one is most often the hardest to accept. Yes, it's difficult to come to terms with growing older, and adapting to changes that occur on a daily basis, but looking into someone's eyes you thought you knew so damn well only to find an unrecognizable shell standing before you is possibly the most paralyzing feeling one can experience. It's one of those surreal moments where you question if you ever really knew this person, or if it was all conceived in your imagination.

You wonder how you arrived at this foreign place, how someone you knew inside and out is now no more than a stranger, you wonder what the hell changed. Did the heart change? Did the mind change? Did you suddenly change, or did I?

The thing about change is that it is vital. We have to change in order to reach our potential, or sometimes even our demise. Sometimes we have to morph into someone we can't recognize anymore in order to realize what we are missing, or to finally appreciate the things we always took for granted. I'm not one of those people who accepts change with open arms, I struggle with it, I refuse to acknowledge it, I sometimes go so far as to hate it. However, recently I've come to terms with the fact that EVERYTHING will inevitably change, and there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. We may not be able to control how the leaves change color in the Fall, or how people become unrecognizable versions of themselves, but we can control how we adapt to the changes we're presented with.

Just remember to always appreciate what you're given, because it can change in an instant.