The fact that things change is not the problem.
The problem is wanting things to stay the same, when they don't.
I hear about it and I read about it all too often - people say our brains are hardwired for "this" or they're hardwired for "that". Most of the things that we are supposedly hardwired for, according to the majority of voices, are simply not true.
One of the things that I have noticed popping up a lot lately seems to be a trendy and growing belief that humans are hardwired to resist change.
I don't know if you've seen any of these articles, but let's take a look at this notion.
To be hardwired means there is nothing you can do about it - it is genetically determined.
To be hardwired means that it was there since the day you were born, that environmental factors have nothing to do with it, and you have no say in the matter.
That's what it means to be biologically hardwired.
For example;
Your eye color is hardwired.
Your hair color is hardwired, while how long it grows and how fast it grows can be determined by environmental factors, such as what you eat and how often it gets cut.
So, to be hardwired to resist change would mean that every single human that is on the planet, and every single human that was here before us, resisted change and never willingly pursued change because it's not in our biology to do so.
Are we hardwired, or are we just hardened?
There's a difference.
What about the person/people who introduced the change?
And how do we explain every explorer and every inventor and every artist throughout human history?
How do we explain every person who changed their occupation, their lifestyle, their physical appearance, or changed their entire life?
It certainly doesn't explain someone selling their house, and everything in it, to have new experiences and to see what life has to offer, as I did.
Every thing we do;
Every experience we have;
Changes us.
New experiences can change our perspective.
Even if those experiences make us more set in our ways,
Isn't that a change?
Everybody wants change, but no one seems to want to change.
Would you refuse a new job where you could double the salary you have now because you were hardwired to resist change?
Would you refuse a winning lottery jackpot because you were afraid it would create too many changes?
Yet here we are, always changing, and we're even accepting change all of the time - as long as it benefits us.
When things are going bad for us, we can take solace in knowing that things are not going to stay the way they are.
But, when things are good we want it to stay that way forever.
We seem to want things to remain the same - but get better.
I think if we're really honest with ourselves we would probably see that we want the things that we don't like to change, and we want the things that we like to not change.
People choose to change all the time.
They change their routines;
Change their occupations;
Change the way they eat;
And change the way they think;
Every single day.
It appears that we are not hardwired to resist change,
But we are more likely hardwired for everything to change us.
"I didn't have a choice."
That's interesting, because I've never met a single situation in which I didn't have a choice.
Maybe it would be better stated that you didn't have a choice that you were willing to take.
To be hardwired means we don't have a choice...
But we do.
If you want to change, you can.
Looking at it this way, to say that we are hardwired to resist change becomes nothing more than a way to justify our limitations or our unwillingness to change.
Then again, I guess if we think the reason we resist change is in our biology, we can continue to feel like we have no choice in the matter.
And nothing will change
Or will it?
Pic by - Grant Krasner
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