Change - embrace the hate of it.

 August 2013

Change – embracing the hate of it.

I HATE change.  Actually, I loathe it!  I constantly crave knowing what is coming next, where we are going, can I get around.  Just let me do my thing with no help and no one watching.  I want to blend in.  But this is seldom my reality, being in a wheelchair.  I cannot count the experiences where I couldn’t get into the restaurant, the hotel bed was too high for me to transfer into, I got lost and ended in a bad part of town but too scared to actually get out of my car, the bathrooms are too small, gravel and hills are the parking lot, and everybody watches and wonders. What will she do?  Good question.

Our oldest is headed to college this fall.  She hates change just as much, probably because it is a trait I wouldn’t let go of and passed to her with great enthusiasm.  In discussing her anxiety, I explained how life is full of ebbs and flows, ups and downs.  It’s the downs that give power to the ups.  We take both and we get through the crap and celebrate the good.  This is life, I explain.  We need to just embrace it all as there is value in it all.  Maybe that’s a lie but it sounded good.  As we rifled through the “need to do” list, she made a joke about a hard thing.  I said “There you go!  That’s you embracing!”  She said, “Oh stoooop.  Stop telling me to brace for life.”  I crack up and say “Embrace!!  Not brace.”  She says, “You say embrace and I say, ‘Look out!  Here comes life!  Brace for it!’”  This girl is FUNNY!!!  

Our personalities are drastically different, of course, b/c God does this for us parents.  This way, we will completely be at a loss, fumbling around with our quesi parenting skills, not understanding the mind and heart of this child we adore.  All of this to grow us, not them.  The challenge becomes in the accepting of who God made THEM, not how I can shape them into “more like me” which is what I understand and can deal with relatively well.  I digress.  Her entire perspective on life is calm beauty.  She doesn’t rush.  She doesn’t do spontaneous.  She is intimate or nothing.  She is formal and purposeful.  That is her living by her standard.  My standard looks quite differently.  I mostly have messy hair, wear jeans and a sweatshirt, gulp coffee out of a mug, and live for people at the expense of a clean house and an ordered calendar.  Different.  Oh, I have come to appreciate her sweet self and have taught my character to shush and organize so her character can shine and be heard.  But where we are glued and see complete eye to eye is this anxiety producing change.  

So where does this leave us?  After years of struggling, fighting, negotiating, my conclusion is nothing better than head down, marching forward, patience intentional and plan flexible.  What else is there to do?  We cannot control change.  We cannot pretend it doesn’t exist.  We cannot run from it.  We cannot make it stop.  I have tried all of these, yet there it is, staring you in the face daring the question, “what are you going to do with me?”  It is change that shapes us, grows us, fulfills a complete thought or process.  Without change, we cannot appreciate the constant, the expected.   It’s change that develops empathy and creativity.  Of course, sometimes, I’m confident I’m creative enough and I understand more intricacies of bodily function than I should, yet on my road of difference, these lessons have somehow allowed me to identify with and encourage others.  There, above our own personal growth, holds the purpose of change, spur on the brother next to you.

That’s really what it’s all about, right?!  We live, feeling the ebbs and flows, developing our compassion, and understanding others to the place of encouragement.  We spur each other on, establishing hope, a sense of “I can do this because you did and you lived.”  And, on the good days, we celebrate.  We have made it.  We breathe deep, etch it in our head, and brace ourselves for the next change.  Or, maybe we embrace it, good and bad, and pass on the livability of change, which is automatic hope for those watching and wondering?  It won’t always look like a present with a bow but that ugly in your ebb gives credence to the challenge behind the change.  Be real with it.  Be real with others.  Make it count towards hope.

Hebrews 10: 24-25 “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.  Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another…”