If the pandemic can teach us anything, it’s this: We CAN change!
One reason the pandemic has been so difficult is because it forced us to change.
Maybe that seems obvious; everyone talked about how everything—school, work, restaurants, church, entertainment, shopping for groceries, shopping for anything, medical care, relationships—changed almost overnight. But I don’t remember focusing on simply the idea of change. We were too upset by the circumstances of change to back up and think beyond the lockdown.
Maybe we should. Maybe we can find some benefit in the last 14 months by deciding what it can teach us about change.
Nothing new
Of course, change was a problem long before Covid-19. Most of us don’t like change, many of us resist it, and even those who say they long for it have habits or rituals in everyday life the rest of us better not touch, thank you.
Don’t tell me how to drink my coffee. Don’t keep me from listening to my favorite music. Don’t make me wear the kind of clothes you like. Don’t force me to fly when I’d rather drive. And don’t make me eat a big breakfast when I usually go for a Pop-Tart.
And don’t tell me to be happy about keeping my kids home from school, spending Christmas alone, or eating my birthday dinner from Styrofoam take-out containers at my boring kitchen table. Forced change is the worst change, and nothing has taught us that better than our pandemic experience.
Leading change
And yet, not all change is bad. In fact, for things to get better, there must always be change. And leaders of any initiative often discover that resistance to change is their biggest challenge.
Workers gripe about changes in benefits or dress codes or the assortment of snacks in the lunchroom vending machine. And when they’re made to work different hours or with a different supervisor or—please don’t tell me!—a new computer system, they protest to the boss or complain to each other. Everyone knows, they say, the old way was better.
And at church (a haven of grace and love, right?), unfortunately the situation is no different. In fact, sometimes it’s worse, because people don’t go to church to get a paycheck. Most of us want to feel as though our church is my church. When it changes, it unnerves me.
Who, me?
And individual, personal change may be the most difficult to achieve. Losing weight, drinking less alcohol, doing more exercise, refraining from gossip, saving money, walking away from a damaging relationship—everyone agrees each of these is good, so why has almost everyone struggled with at least one of them?
The answer comes in a simple formula. For change to happen, the cost of the status quo must be higher than the cost of change. That is, the pain of leaving things as they are must exceed the pain of making the change.
When eating a particular food makes you sicker than the pleasure you get from consuming it, you change your diet. When the professor says you’ll fail the class with one more tardy, you find a way to get there on time. When the addict proverbially “hits bottom,” he admits he needs help.
Sometimes the possibility of change is just too frightening. The mother of abused children doesn’t go to the authorities, because she’s afraid to live without her husband. The battered wife endures the punches because she’s too ashamed to confide in a friend. The struggler with failure goes from job to job and partner to partner because he’s afraid of what success would demand from him.
Planned by God
Our discomfort with change, especially sudden and complete changes like those of our pandemic, is interesting in light of the Bible’s promotion of change. Nothing could signal a bigger change than “You must be born again.” Paul said anyone in Christ is a “new creation.” James told sinners to change laughter to mourning and joy to gloom as a part of necessary repentance. Jesus explained that seekers for God must “change and become like little children.”
The psalmist prayed, “Create in me a clean heart, O God.” There’s a positive picture of change. How refreshing it is to find a favorite T-shirt in my drawer, all bright and unstained, ready for me to wear again.
It reminds me how good change can be. Wherever dirt is gone, change has happened. Whenever growth is present, change has taken place. However progress has been achieved, someone has paid the price of change.
It’s time
Older folks (yes, I am one) sometimes feel overwhelmed by change. No generation has seen more of it than us boomers. The pandemic can teach us we all have capacity to change. Maybe it can motivate us to see the pain points in our lives and decide, “This just must change!”
If you’re not thinking about changing something—a habit, a pattern, an attitude, a goal—you may be cheating yourself. Almost any of us can find at least one thing in our lives that should change—and could. If we’re feeling unsettled because the pandemic has changed so many aspects of our everyday life, maybe that’s good. With change all around us, perhaps it’s time to add my own changes to the mix. And maybe now I’ll have courage to make the change I need, the world wants, and God is just waiting to use for his glory.
Photos by Edwin Hooper, Thought Catalog, and Ross Findon on Unsplash
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