What are you choosing by not changing?

Happy Sunday and thank you for opening this week’s #TheLifeofJLOWE newsletter! Can you believe that today is the first of DECEMBER!?

This year has absolutely flown by, but it has been absolutely nothing short of eventful. It’s amazing to look back at the year and see how things have changed, how I’ve developed as a person and what I’ve accomplished in the 11 months that have passed by in the blink of an eye.

It’s so funny how time works - in certain moments, it can feel slow and excruciating, but at other times like it’s moving way too fast. I guess time really does fly when you’re having fun.

Change as a choice

Throughout this year, I’ve learnt a lot about navigating the world on my own as a young adult, and I’ve especially learnt that my life is in my own hands.

Earlier this year, in my corporate job, I learnt how to advocate for myself and how to speak up when I’m being treated unfairly. Further than that, I learnt how to make a tough decision like quitting when multiple things weren’t going right and my own well-being was at risk.

These things taught me that change is a choice, and that you’re never really stuck even though sometimes you might feel like it. It’s easy to think yourself into a rut, and feel like there’s every reason in the world why you’re stuck where you are, but sometimes all it really takes is a change of perspective to ensure that you’re living your own life, rather than just letting life happen to you.

Stasis as a choice

In the same way that change is a choice, staying in the same place in your life is a choice too. This doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a bad choice, but I think it’s important to recognize that what you’re not actively changing, you’re passively choosing.

We’re always saying things like “I wish I would start going to the gym”, or “I wish I could eat healthier” or “I wish I could have a different job” but by wishing and not acting, you’re choosing to remain with the habits and situation that you’re in.

It may not feel like a choice because it’s passively happening, but there is always an opportunity to take steps towards change. Change doesn’t always have to happen immediately - in fact, most of the times it certainly won’t - but it’s important to actively start the process of engaging in change when you want to see it happen.

Change as a constant

It’s true that the only constant is change, but as I’ve written about before, you can’t take growth for granted - and growth is the kind of change that you want to see throughout your life. Change will always happen whether to you or the environment around you, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re becoming better as a person or making changes towards where you want to be.

It’s important to recognize that while change is a constant because of the nature of the world, just because you can be sure something will change in your life over time, passively choosing to be static in life sets you up to move slowly through your years rather than moving at the speed that your life demands.

You don’t want to blink and see that you’re not where you want to be in life because you didn’t choose yourself.

Wouldn’t you rather be driving the boat instead of just riding the waves?

Conclusion

Of course, not everything is in our control to change in the immediate future. Maybe there’s things you can’t reasonably change in the next month, year or even 5 years.

However, what’s for sure is that there is something in your life that you want to change, that is within your ability to change.

For those things in your life, remember this - what you’re not changing, you’re choosing.

Recognise that making the passive choice to retain bad habits, to sit in your unhappy situation and to stay where you don’t want to be is your own prerogative. Nobody will change those things for you, and recognising that you are choosing those things for yourself by not changing them is the first step to owning your problems so you can solve them.

It makes no sense to complain about things that you can change, so if you find yourself wishing for, longing for and hoping for better, own your current situation as an option that you’re choosing, and make the active choice to change.

Recognising that you always have options in front of you, and that you’re also always choosing one of those options - in every moment if your life - will allow you to see that you can always choose differently for yourself. You can always choose to be better, choose to do better, and actively start to make the changes that you want to see for yourself today.

Until next Sunday,

Justin