Changes

Change is something I've often thought about. What motivates someone to change? What makes change last? How much control do we have over change?

I think I first started thinking deeply about change when I was doing my undergrad at BYU. There were many changes in my life simply because I was living on my own, but also I became more aware of who I was and what I wanted to become... and I knew there weer many things about me and my life I wanted to change.

One of my dearest friends and roommate at BYU introduced me to the song "Changes" by 2PAC. (She is one of the most Christ-like people I know, but we would often joke with her about being a "gangsta'" in another life!!) Anyway, one of the refrains states:

We gotta make a change...
It's time for us as a people to start makin' some changes.
Let's change the way we eat, let's change the way we live
and let's change the way we treat each other.
You see the old way wasn't working so it's on us to do
what we gotta do, to survive.

I agree with this. As a people, we do need to make many changes, but for me, personally, I need to make many changes cause the old way just isn't workin' for me anymore! And, no one can make these changes but me. That's what it comes down to... no one but me.

I just finished reading a book someone gave me for Christmas (I got a lot of books, ok?!!) The author talks about how change happens in an instant. It doesn't take years, months, or weeks of grueling effort-it happens the instant the mind is truly made up. And, it happens again the next day as you make decisions that affect your life. You live that change every day with the decisions you make, but the change happens in the instant you make it.

The author makes another good point. "How do I know that I wanted to write this book? Because I'm writing it. I used to say I wanted to write a book. ... I would get frustrated with myself as the years passed and I hadn't written a word.... I would think, 'If only I had more time, I could work on the book. If only I wasn't so busy all the time with my job, I could really spend time writing.... That was a lie... big fat lie I was telling myself. The truth is I didn't want to write the book. If I had wanted to, I would have. ... I know it now because the second I really wanted to write the book, I did."

That example hit me hard. I've experienced it personally this year. I kept putting the "change" off with a boat-load of excuses, but once I really wanted to change, REALLY wanted it, the change was in an instant. Now, of course I am not going to say I have the power to make such changes and stick with them on my own. Never will I be able to do that. I've learned that the hard way. It takes humility, coming to know the Savior and the Atonement, and prayer. At least that's what it took for me...

The author goes on to say explain that the only way to fix your world is to fix yourself. I know that I've often wanted others to change and it's never-ending. It's the source of more frustration than it really should be. "'I wish they were different.' It's a fruitless, destructive waste of time to think this." The only thing we can do is change ourselves and the way we think/act.

Over the past two weeks I have seen this come true in a relationship I have with one of my co-workers. If I change myself, address the problem in me, my world changes... and it's a MUCH HAPPIER WORLD!!!