Change is what you make it.

Change is such a dirty word for those who aren’t willing to see things optimistically. It strikes the fear of God into people who are comfortable and complacent.

Whether it be personal, professional, geographical, mental… change is inevitable. So why do people fight it so much?

I had a chat with my current manager (over a schooner of sour cherry, brandy-barrel-stored beer which he openly judged me on) about the concept of change. I had this conversation after work on the night before my last day in my current job.

Granted my new job is just working on a different floor, for the same company, on the ‘other side of the fence’ from what I am currently doing, but it’s still a drastic change… and I’m OK with it.

We talked about teams, processes, personalities and how much everything has changed with so many moving parts for us over the last couple of years.

But how much of it has been positive change from the get go? Has there been a general consensus of acceptance and glee? F@#k no! I myself have been guilty of ‘fighting’ an idea because it was something different. But I’ve consciously started to shift my mentality.

If we don’t change, we don’t evolve. Without evolution, nothing can be improved and without improvements, there is the assumption that everything at this point in time is perfect.

People fight change for different reasons. The idea of ‘but that’s how we’ve always done it’ stems from laziness. The thought that ‘it won’t work anyway’ comes from insecurities and lack of faith in yourself and your peers. When you think ‘why do we have to try something different when what we are doing isn’t great, but it works’ stems from a fear of failing.

Change happens. Good, bad, ugly, incredible… it happens. And it happens every day, so we need to start accepting change as a path of progression and let it take us to something new. Whether it’s something out of your control, or something you have decided, let it happen. Change is what you make it. If you see change as a ‘bad’ thing, it will be a bad experience for you as you constantly seek to use it as an excuse.

To help shift the mentality, you can start by forcing the way of thinking in anything you do. I challenge the potential 3–5 people that may read this… to change something in your everyday life, often. Get a new haircut, explore a new area around home or work, speak to a random person, move furniture around, push the boundaries at work and get more involved, try a new cafe, learn something online.

If nothing changes, life gets boring and stagnant like a stinky body of water that never moves and turns to green sludge. Don’t be like the green sludge… CHANGE!