Change scares the hell out of us.
We tell ourselves that isn’t the case. Yet it is. We don’t learn to change, we actually learn to do one thing (or a bunch of things) and then to do it better and better. That is, actually, the opposite of change. Long ago we learn that specialization help us all. If we all do different things, each of those tasks will be done better, because each of us will be doing his own task, better after each repetition. No time to change, just to improve.
Change is all what we want.
Consider all these big religions. Christianity, Islam. Consider those hugely popular philosophies, like buddhism. Or all those millions and millions of self help and coaching books sell all over the place. What do they all promise, what do they keep on trying and trying? Change, of course. It is all about becoming somebody else, be reborn into a better set of ethical principles, into a new life, into a better self. All these great successes of marketing, all these manuals for living actually are telling you how to change. And we all love those tales.
So what is it, then. Do we love it or do we hate it?
Thinking about this I got to think, not surprisingly, on my sword. Pretty much every other cut I have learned so far is about making at least half of a circle, like a pendulum. We raise the sword, and then we let it fall to make a cut. There are more examples from the sports world, like kicking or throwing a ball, when we stretch our leg or our arm behind as much as possible… and from there we release the kick. It is all about that moment in which the stretch is complete, when the sword has reached the maximum. Will we really release the kick? will we really cut? Think in the pendulum. Why is it so fascinating to look at a pendulum? If you ask me, it is the two moment at the end of the trajectory, when everything slows down and down and down… until there is no movement, even if only for a second, for a millisecond. That moment, that moment of possible change. We know that a pendulum will sling, and yet it looks like it will stop. And that makes it fascinating. And perhaps that is change, that is what is possible in the moment of change. The moment in which all can change direction, can stop, can go on. A moment where there are no certainties, no preassigned directions, no destiny.
No destiny. Scary. Lovely. No destiny.