*Image Credit  Hajime NAKANO

Well I have been working my big ass off over the last week and I can tell you I feel the pressure of it. So much so that I have made a decision that I no longer wish to live a life where I am constantly required to answer email, work overtime and not get paid. So I began thinking what changes could I make? As I thought about it I noticed all the things I would have to do to actually make the change happen. This is not to mention serendipity either (something I appear to have no control over… or I do and just don’t know or perhaps combinations of both… but I digress).

Change requires learning

To make a change you need to learn your way forward. What is going to work and what is not going to work? What concepts will we use and what won’t we? A plan takes time to emerge and direction is not always forthcoming. There are just sometimes when you have to do it to be where you need to be. That means making a commitment to take action and suffer the consequences… rather than put up with a life that’s less than satisfactory. Change therefore requires learning and learning requires action. What a horrible pair they are!

If you want to do it… you must go through it!

Unfortunately taking new directions probably doesn’t mean the path of least resistance. You have to fail your way to success more often than not. So a holiday is better than change in that respect because change takes a lot more work than a holiday. However if change is lasting and makes a long term difference in your life then it’s worth it isn’t it?

So in summary I can’t conclusively say that change is as good as a holiday with this micro thought. I can say I would like to have a holiday to defer change. Because taking a holiday is shirtloads better than making changes! It’s very hard to change.

I was reading the bible the other day when something I hadn’t seen before smacked me in the chops. Jesus was talking to his disciples about unforgiveness in Luke 17. Jesus told them that if a brother comes to you seven times in day and sins against then asks for forgiveness you should forgive him each time. The disciples were amazed by this because they asked for more faith. What Jesus says next always bothered me. He said that if you had faith as a mustard seed you would say to this mulberry tree be uprooted and be planted in the sea and it would obey you.  I had glossed over that many times.  This time however I read the bit about being a servant underneath and was even more perplexed.  Then it struck me.  Jesus is saying that faith (or an expressed belief) needs to be replaced by another expressed belief in order for the previous belief to be ‘removed and cast into the sea.  I would one belief dissolves the other and removes it’s potency because it stops the previous one from existing.   That is, you get rid of old beliefs by replacing them with new ones that are more powerful.

As you find ways to remove old beliefs about your life, circumstances and so on… it’s like the old beliefs were never there.  Indeed you can make yourself believe anything if you lie to yourself often enough can’t you?  You can change memories, change habits, change how you feel… by having your beliefs changed.  Yet the how is the part we want isn’t it?  How and/or can we change our beliefs?  What I think Jesus might have been saying was this: You can forgive if you believe you can because that belief will enable you to act.  Love is a powerful emotion… use it!  Use what you have and you might just be surprised at what follows.