1905
A friend recently sent me a reminder of how much things change. He listed various facts from the year 1905. For example, in 1905 the Eiffel Tower (1,000 feet tall) was the tallest structure in the world (today Taipei 101 at 1667 feet), the population of Las Vegas, Nevada (in 2003, over 500,000), was 30, there were only 230 reported murders in the United States (over 15,000 in 2002) and crossword puzzles hadn't yet been invented. His list of facts highlighted some positive changes, some negative changes and some I would count as neutral. Higher buildings and more populous cities are at best neutral in my mind and I find the current murder statistics frightening. I do enjoy crossword puzzles, however.
I normally dislike change, I tend to resist change, I often wish that things would stay the same. I look around at the changes in the world and find many of them bad. But lists like my friend's remind me that whether I like it or not, no matter how hard I resist, no matter how fervently I wish, change is inevitable. Such lists remind me how dramatic change can be and that some changes are good. Whether good or bad, though, things will change. Things will change around us, we will change, our friends and families will change. People will age, will become ill, will change their interests, will move, will get new jobs. And even good changes can be disruptive, painful. When a friend moves away to take a better job or to move to a better climate, it will still be painful for those of us left behind.
We're forced to accept change but we need not remain passive in the face of negative change. We can seek to make things better as they change, we can influence how things change and the pace of change, we can promote positive changes. It's all part of helping others and ourselves. Embrace good changes and help others to accommodate them, try to prevent or delay bad changes, and try to understand the difference. We need to resist the notion that change for the sake of change is good but I would go so far as to say we should seek positive change. In this way, we will be doing our best to make things better for ourselves and others.
7-4-05 (Happy Birthday, United States of America)
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