Accepting Change … And Growing

By Susan Flansburg

I wrote about change for the Benedictines a couple of years ago, sharing the wisdom of the Sisters. May we all benefit from the lessons they shared with me!

Sister Jozefa Seskar was 14 years old when the Nazis showed up on her family’s farm in Slovenia. Reacting quickly, she climbed a tree to hide. Although she escaped capture that day, her ordeal had just begun. It lasted for years.

You’d never have guessed how much she had lost. To meet Sr. Jozefa as an adult was to meet the most cheerful, giving person in the world. She was always beaming, patting your arm, telling you she loved you.

Sr. Jozefa’s secret was to accept change and move on. To look to the future.

Of course, change is relative. Losing a loved one, struggling with a terminal disease, surviving forced displacement or experiencing a major accident are existentially traumatic.

But any change can undermine goodwill in a subversive way. How often, for example, do we look in the mirror and nod happily at our graying hair and deepening lines? How lightly do we let go of possessions? Of ideas? Of plans?

#1: Don’t Try to Avoid It!

Substantial change - and we each define what substantial means for ourselves - presents us with only one sustainable choice. We must acknowledge the reality of the change, and intentionally move through it. Avoidance not only doesn’t work, it can hurt.

Think of all the times you’ve busied yourself, focusing on some trivial matter in order to dodge the hard work of real change.

The floor must be scrubbed! Papers must be sorted and filed! Facebook must be checked!

Avoidance often ultimately manifests in anger, which can overtake our thoughts and heart entirely.

#2: Don’t Get Stuck!

Another danger occurs when we wade into the issue … and stay there, ruminating.

I didn’t deserve to experience (fill in the blank)! So-and-so was out to get me! No one ever helps me with anything!

It may seem easier to let these stories play over and over, but we never get anywhere. We never learn anything new.

We can trigger a sense of victimhood, which can lead to depression.

So, after we acknowledge the change - a lost opportunity, a lost loved one, a lost expectation - we must keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Find the blessings that attend the change. Articulate our gratitude for those blessings. Write them down daily.

#3: Keep Moving!

Sister Sheila McGrath likened the above steps to crossing a field of burrs in my article:

"You can refuse to cross it by staying so busy you don't have time to think about it. … You can remain stuck in the middle because the burrs hurt more when you move. … Yes, it hurts. The burrs stick and scratch. But when you get to the other side, you often discover you have grown and learned a lot. You feel renewed."

Change … and Grow

Every beginning requires an end: Night becomes day; a caterpillar becomes a butterfly; an acorn becomes an oak tree; a baby becomes an adult.

Every hour of every day we change, whether we are standing on the sidelines, stuck in burrs or moving forward through the field.

By accepting it, we can continue to become who we want to become:

The majestic dawn, the beautiful butterfly, the mighty oak, the functioning and wise adult.

We become who we are meant to be, even when - and maybe even because - it sometimes hurts.

So, farewell 2019 and hello 2020, bring what it may!