I am not one of those people who dread change; I would even go as far to say I am oddly comfortable with the idea. It happens every day, every month, and every year. It comes in all shapes and sizes, with varying levels of anxiety-crippling excitement. Change — while sometimes voluntary, sometimes not — is inevitable.
What makes a girl pack up her perfectly plush life on the East Coast and blindly move to Tahoe? What makes a lifelong junkie finally quit? But, I wonder, what are the factors that really make us follow through and take that leap?
It is my belief that the selfish person inside all of us needs that personal call to action; we need somehow to benefit from the change. Even if that benefit is simply the satisfaction of a job well done.
This summer I saw the documentary Cowspiracy, which shines a light on the shockingly detrimental environmental impacts of cattle farming, also covered in our story Beef — It’s Warming the Planet (here). But, after watching the indisputable facts thrown at my brain, I still didn’t kick my cheeseburger habit. I remember thinking after the movie, I know this is what I should do, but I also knew it was something I wouldn’t. Within a week, I was back on that red meat train. While planet Earth needed (and still needs) me to change, I didn’t.
After graduating from college, I landed myself a pretty cozy, yet painfully boring, job in Manhattan. Everything was fine. Sure, I could have made it work, but my soul craved change. I barely made it four months before I was in a fully-packed car with three of my best girlfriends headed West. I’ve never looked back.
Sometimes we are forced to change to remedy a past mistake, as the Tahoe Keys is having to do (here). Sometimes we change to adapt to something uncontrollable going on around us, as many Lake Tahoe ski resorts have begun to do through their snowmaking efforts (here). Sometimes we make changes for a loved one, as a local family did to support their daughter’s dreams for ski cross success (here). And, sometimes, we simply change because we are starving for the new and unknown.
Whatever the reason, we need to look at change as a way to create our own destiny, modify what we know, and make it work.
Embrace the change.
