Got Too Much Change?

Columbia River Gorge in Autumn

Kayaking on the Willamette River in November

I've been noticing some changes lately. Today while walking Charlie I was struck by change -- not nickels and dimes; that might hurt --but rather how different everything looks now on the path from when we walked along it just last week. I try to pay attention and be aware of the life around me as we walk, try to make it a contemplative prayer walk rather than a get-it-done walk. I look for God in the beauty I see, and this time of year there is plenty of beauty out there. The weather is cooler, the days shorter, the sky not as blue.

Today’s message on the walk was a reminder of the constancy of change. As I wrote in the introduction to “Real Women, Real Wisdom,” there is no insurance you can buy to prevent change. It can’t be stopped. Life is a change agent: as long as there is life, there will be change. It’s kind of a paradox: everything changes except change.

Today the river that was so wild and full just a few months ago had relaxed into a fairly quiet, docile stream, and the shoreline has grown as the river has shrunk.  I would guess it’s dropped 25 feet or more since early summer. 

The tall green grasses and brush along the path have all gone to seed and the smaller birds are feasting; many of the grasses are now brown and dead-looking. The osprey family has abandoned its huge nest for another climate where the fishing is better.

Of course, the deciduous trees are changing color daily. The sweet gum trees in my neighborhood that were more than half green a couple days ago today are bright scarlet. The leaves are hanging around later this fall – something to do with all the rain this spring and summer, the weather geeks say. The leaves are also unusually brilliant in color. I think I say that every fall but it’s actually true this year, at least according to those same meteorologists.  

Of course I am changing too. Physically I get older every day, gaining new little pains or issues. This summer I started working with a chiropractor to address some issues with the narrowing of my spinal column (spinal stenosis) and then worked with a naturopath to look at my diet and how it might be impacting my health. We made some major changes – eliminating all grains, dairy, sugars – but I found it too challenging and elected to just try gluten- and lactose-free for the time being. It seems to help.

But I have to accept that I am no longer in my 20s or 30s, no longer able to do some of the things that were so easy back then.  That can be frustrating. I had to hire someone to help me finish some of the yard work I’ve been hoping to get to all summer. It wasn’t happening and every time I worked on it, I paid for it with a good deal of back pain.

At the same time, as I have grown emotionally and spiritually these last few years, I find I am much more at peace with the person I am, with my limitations and failures, as well as with my successes and blessings. I am more accepting. And perhaps that is what change teaches us – whether it comes on fast and furious like a flood or slowly over time like the leaves changing color.  If we can accept that things change and that we often have little or no control over them, we learn to adjust. We adjust our viewpoints, our expectations. We learn better how to live in the now, because we realize our now will likely look very different next week or month or year. And we learn to appreciate and be thankful for what we have, even the hard things.  

As we change and grow, we often get little epiphanies about how something that seemed very painful at the time was, in fact, a gift that helped us on our journey. I had that experience last month. A woman in my spiritual direction class was preparing for her upcoming wedding. She shared with me how long she’d had to wait to find the right partner but admitted that it was for the best. She said it really took those long years for her to become the person who could appreciate the man she was planning to marry. She needed all that time to get to know and love herself, to be ready for this relationship.  It struck me that the losses I’ve experienced over the last eight years, though incredibly painful, were necessary for me to begin my own journey of knowing and loving myself. 

So I try to remain open to the change, embrace it even. I trust that I am in good hands and the God who knows and loves each of us better than we will ever know ourselves will not steer me wrong.