I don’t deal with change very well. I like consistency. I have got the Gallup strength finder test to even back me up on this, because according to the test, consistency is one of my top strengths. However, on numerous occasions, I have been reminded of the ironic truth: change is the only constant in life.
Here I am, on a Monday afternoon at 3:30 PM, in my dad’s car driving my little sister to the pool for her swimming lesson. As we turn left at one of the 3 traffic lights in our town the words “Water You turned into wine... Opened the eyes of the blind…” start playing on the radio and we sing along for the rest of the ride.
At 2:30 PM on Thursday my best friend and I drive up to the community park sat in the playground and eat a packed late lunch.
On Friday at 11:00 AM I walk into room 221 at the high school with my best friend. We sit and talk to each other and our favorite math teacher. These were things I did regularly.
Every Monday we took my sister to her swim lessons, I went to the park after school about once a week and every day I spent my lunch time with my best friend in our math teacher’s classroom. We even heard Chris Tomlin’s Our God Is Greater fairly often in the car. You’d be surprised by how much the radio plays that song.
Then I moved away. I built new habits and found different things to do on Mondays at 3:30 pm and at lunch during the weekdays. At first, I was overwhelmed by the amount of school work, by living on my own and by the pressure of meeting new people and just being at college. So much was changing. In fact, it felt like everything was changing in some way, and I was not super excited about most of it.
After building new habits, I was scared my old habits at home would disappear and things would be too different when I went back. Change is ineluctable, unavoidable and is, after all, the only constant in life.
However, some things do remain the same, even if it is small things. If you don’t deal well with change don’t let it rock your boat. Find your moments in the car when the overplayed song comes on for the millionth time and hold on to the little amount of steady in your world filled with constant change.
