Change: is it good?

Change seems to be one of those words that tend to be either avoided or embraced. Like pickled herring, you either like it or you don't.  The only change that I feel up to dealing with on most days is the change that goes jingle tingle in my pocket and that can be annoying enough. The change that we face in our lives can bring a lot of good things; but for the most part we tend to think that change is something that we have to do. I have learned that "change" is something that happens whether we want it or not and HOW we choose to react to it will bring either good or bad experiences with it...I think this following quote; a twist on the Serenity Prayer sums up "change" nicely.

 

God grant me the serenity 

to accept the people I cannot change, 

the courage to change the one I can, 

and the wisdom to know it's me.  

~Author Unknown

Can I change me? Maybe I can change how I respond to situations and in that, I am changing my behavior rather than my essence. Rather than hoping for my circumstances to change, I can work on how I perceive and deal with them instead. I can say that I have never had many conscious thoughts that I had to change who I was. Most of the time, I realize, that I needed to consciously decide how to respond and trust that my reactions could positively affect the situations that I was facing.

Negative change required me to move (relocate my home and take all my stuff) five times in less than eight years. I was living in an abusive marriage and it did NOT change. I lost many priceless and precious possessions during these times. At times, I feel as if I have lost so much of my life.

In the past two years, I have accepted and even welcomed change that I had only hoped would be good for me and my son. I started this period of my life while living in my abusive marriage while taking my parents in with us; myself and son with my abusive husband and his daughter while I cared for my family and worked full time. 

My parents moved out and I moved out a few months later which was a big change for me; a welcome and much needed change. I took care of my own finances for my son and myself. and while living apart from abuse, I worked diligently on my own healing and found that I really enjoyed my life. 

I refused abuse and in the following three months I did not have much contact with my soon to be ex husband and his daughter. 

A few months later, I re-established communication between my son and I with his father and we began "talking". We even went on vacation out of state, together.  

As few more months went by, his abuse ensued. I no longer opened my home to him.  

In the following 4 months, we had minimal contact while I was healing even more. 

In August 2010, I gave him "one last chance" to eliminate abuse from our marriage and relationship but he refused to admit that he had been verbally abusive toward me.  The "last chance" came and went in a fury of denial while I offered a calm, cool "thank you for coming" as I escorted him for the last time out of my home. 

Minimal contact occurred for the following four months while he incessantly sent a barrage of verbally abusive and controlling emails that deserved NO response. 

My resolve to end this charade of a marriage in divorce was at an all time high. It was January 2011 by this time and I contacted a lawyer; met with her and proceeded in getting legal counsel to end this abusive marriage. More change came. My workplace suffered a tragic death of an employee whom I had personally known for over 23 years. My life changed at that moment. I was faced with a truth that would change my world forever. I would no longer just think about my first love but I would change how I would respond to his memory by contacting him. I knew that death could separate us forever and I was not willing for that kind of change to occur in my life. 

In the past five months, I resigned from my employment of 23 years and relocated to live with my "first love" and continue divorce proceedings. I so look forward to the biggest change in my life; marrying my "first love" soon.

If these ramblings haven't made you totally dizzy; I apologize if they have, we can take hope that change doesn't have to be an unwelcome guest or disruptive visitor. We can stop and say to ourselves "change is good" and how and what I do with the change in my life can bring about good things. We can even learn to say "I like change". 

For me, coming out of a life of abuse and into "my life" is a good change that I am very happy to live with for the rest of my life.