I used to have a really bad habit. I’m so happy to be able to report this habit as a thing of the past. I do still occasionally struggle with it. However, I don’t as much as I used to.

Here’s the bad habit. There was a time when I looked on the past with great nostalgia. I looked to the future with anxiety and anticipation. I completely ignored or loathed the present.

How can this be? Isn’t the present just tomorrow’s past? As Merle Haggard once crooned, “Are the good times really over for good?” Why can’t I seem to recognize the “good ole days” while they’re happening?

No Merle they aren’t. In fact today you and I are living in what we will one day call “the good ole days”. So why aren’t we enjoying them? Oh. I know. It’s because along the way there is change, and most of us hate change. We avoid change.

Employee: “So why do we do it that way?”

Employer: “Because that’s the way we’ve always done it.”

Employee: “Should we change that?”

Employer: “No, young man. We hate change.”

Funny thing is this conversation could have well happened between two K-Mart employees during “the good ole days.”

This plays out every day. Our minds and bodies are made for survival. As such, we tend to like what we know. Uncertainty freaks us out. Want to know why were are really worried about inflation, Russia and all that’s melting down in the world? It’s because we are worried about how it will change our lives.

The source of our happiness never remains constant. It must always change. Imagine trying to plow a field backwards. You wouldn’t fair very well I’m afraid. Now let’s say you hoe the perfect row. You love your row so much you go over it again and again. What will you eventually have? Your beautiful row will become a rut. You must change your location and plow a new row. That’s how life works.

Confucius said, “The one who would be constant in happiness must frequently change.”

The C-man is right. We must always change. While we hate change as an idea, humans love novelty. What is novelty? Well, gimme a second. I’m literally going to look it up and report back.

noun 1.

“the quality of being new, original, or unusual.”

See, it’s usual that makes us feel safe, but doesn’t bring us much happiness. We must always be growing and changing to have a constant sense of happiness. It’s the unusual that proceeds happiness.

This is one of the reasons my motto is to “improve always in ALL ways.” We must always be evolving, changing, growing. This is how happiness stays with us.

Life is much like a symphony. All the elements must be continually changing. To listen to the same bar over and over would ruin the entire symphony.

Like Anthony De Mello says, “Let them pass, let them flow. The whole enjoyment of a symphony lies in your readiness to allow the notes to pass.”

What about a song? Have you ever heard a song for the first time and it blew you away? Then you start to listen to it over and over. Eventually you tire of it. What changed? Nothing. That’s the problem.

I am someone who personally hates the idea of change, but I have learned to appreciate it when it comes about. I just spent a week with my youngest daughter in Colorado helping her heal from a surgery on her ACL.

I miss her being a little girl at home, but that had to change. Those could be looked at as “the good ole days”. However, that would have devalued the amazing time she and I had talking as two adults. We shared funny memories. We talked about her future that was much closer now than then.

I thank God I now realize this past week was tomorrow’s good ole days and enjoyed each and every second in the present.

I know I can’t play that song over and over. Abby must grow. She must evolve and so must I. She’ll get married. She’ll have children. Change will come. Oh crap. That makes me a grandpa. Hmm, I feel the old habit of being anxious for the future returning.

Sorry. Ok. Let’s get back in the character..

If I were able, would I freeze time and keep my little girl in pigtails? Probably. But fortunately God is writing this symphony not me. I can’t wait to see what notes He has in mind. Until then, I will savor the ones He’s written but I will let them pass and make room for new ones.