I still don't like change....
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| Fri, 01-27-2006 - 8:26am |
Does anyone else feel this way? Is it just me, or is it tied to my debt and the stress that goes along with it?
Back when my debt was still being hidden from my Dh, I found that I really hated change. Change in accounts, changes in terms, even when our bank was bought out by another bank, I got anxious. Nothing changed except our account numbers, but still....I was anxious. Now that my debt is being paid down, and Dh is aware of our debt, I still feel anxious about changes, no matter how big or small. Switching from paying bills through the mail to paying online...and with each company that I added to our online payments, I felt nervous ("will it go through? Will there be problems??")
For example, this morning, I felt happy that I'd gotten online and paid my bills that were due in the next week....but then Dh called and said that he thought he'd requested a password change for a company login, but accidentally requested a new password for one of his email accounts instead. SO...what does he do? He decides to change his password on EVERYTHING! He came up with some awfully long, numbers/letters/symbols/uppercase/lowercase password (one that even the CIA couldn't break...it's unreal!) and said that he'd changed it for our banking, his email accounts, his work accounts, his messenger software, and even our Verizon Wireless account and Netflix account! Everything! He was calling to let me know what it was, and also to ask me to change the password for our Etrade transactions and a few other sites. And after I got off the phone, my hands were actually shaking from being so anxious.
I mean, logic tells me that once all the passwords are changed, they will stay that way for another three months before he changes them again, so after today, I can relax and know that everything will stay the same for awhile...and it's only a different password, which is not such a big deal...but it's just the actual fear of change that bothers me.
Please someone tell me I'm not alone. If there are others who feel the same, how do you handle the anxiety?
Pat

Thank you sooo much for sharing about your feelings with this. It helps me to not feel so alone. :-D
Pat :-D
Yup, I am not fond of change either, but I've come to the realization that it all will change regardless of what I think, LOL!
In my Faith class last term I wrote something about that exact thing in a paper. I was doing my final paper on one of the books I'd read, "Called to Question: A Spiritual Memoir" by Sr. Joan Chittister, and one of the chapters talks about this. This is what I wrote:
In chapter twelve, “Darkness: A Way to the Light,” Chittister explains that sometimes “aith and life have a way of getting all mixed up together” (89). She says that when things are going badly we blame God for our misfortunes, forgetting “that without God we would never survive…at all” (89). She states that the “arkness is a very spiritual thing” because it “is the way we come to see” and “opens us to new possibilities” (91). In her journal response to Myra B. Nagel’s “he season of Lent is a time to reflect on the cross and the meaning for our lives” Chittister muses that everyone is changed through their journeys, especially if it has been an arduous one (92). In many ways, she understands that it is the fire that tempers us, and we are made the better for it. However, she also knows human nature well: we are reluctant to let go of what was, and what is, in order to move toward what could be. “We measure all good by the good we have today …and fail to see that more is possible” (94). When we let ourselves move forward through the darkness, and let go enough to trust that God loves us enough to lead us to Him, we can perhaps glimpse what love really is.
Also, in my personal reflection on the book:
I fully admit that I am one to hold onto what is, reluctantly moving forward into what will be. I completely understood what Chittister meant when she wrote that the journey changes us, and that we are never the same person at the end of it all as we were when we started, nor should we be. If we are, then I think we have completely and utterly missed the point. In order for change to take place, we all must remember that it only takes one pinpoint of light for the darkness to be diminished (author’s note: no, I did not get that from any source. I thought it up all on my own.)
I don't know how many times in my life I've felt like I've 'welcomed' change by kicking and screaming about it, but I do know this-in the end, it's all good.
Hang in there-it's all good.
~Lisa