Freshman Tens. (Or what is, the anatomy of someone dealing with change.)

When the going gets tough, students usually turn to thoughts of….
food?

And if that was your family’s way of coping with the rough, i think you may need a bigger kitchen in place. Whether that belied your actually biographical history to gain that Freshie Weight of a probably-historically-accurate ten pounds or having gained it to amortise the massive amounts of energy your body needs to consume to get you from building to building, class to class, hall to hall, i think it makes a lot of sense.

The number of changes are numerous in our average lifespan of 60-70 years.

I could account for these having grown up to almost three-quarters’ worth in my lifetime. I could think of Seven (or a projection of Nine, in theory), and probably more to come in the next 30 years still. Not sure i want to see that oncoming, unless it was promised to be any fun, that is.

1/ First: Kindergarten. & Being with strangers.

Our first plight, of our inevitable contact with other people. Will always be stressful. I was three and a half, and wanted to run home every time my mother would drop me off the neighbourhood Kindy.

(And they, the child shrink Dr.-Spockian-wannabes) would tut-tut: “Hmm. This is not a good sign.”)

2/ Second: The Primary School-years.

Moving up levels are always scary.

When we scare the cling wrap out of our momma’s blood flow, and not stay in our first grade seats, without straying to the nurse’s or librarian’s quarters, bugging them to take us home.

3/ Third: Moving houses. Moving schools. Moving friends.

All are difficult (at any age) - it’s like a rite of passage, but without the need for them. These make transitions any easier if we know it’s something that we need to go through, like your first tooth dropping, or that inevitable haircut. How can we make things like a smaller room, ending to squish in with 3 more siblings happen?

Probably easier to scrutinise outcomes or anticipate its damage, with the objective of the overall effectiveness of the circumstance of change defined (at all stages) as: least amount of scuff, no losses, quick and painless.

4/ Fourth: The death of a loved one. Or just death.

The loss of people will always add additional stress to function and systems that have run with them perfectly - whether they were central to it, or just peripheral - or remotely. If you were raised in intergenerational households, you’ll know how that works. Your children work better when they see how you respect your elders, even just on a weekly basis - and how to treat them with regard, rather than the island that is just you.

The loss is more stressful on young people. It was like, grandma and grandpa were there, giving us presents, and coming to see us at Christmas.
And then they weren’t.

5/ Fifth: Growing up.

All the changes in stages: puberty, falling in love, periodic hormonal wreaks of havoc, stabilising your chemical changes tend to look outwards for external non-breaking down. This is anticipated in the teenage offspring. Plan wisely.

Also, stock up on things like witty oxy-morons, novel recipes, and funny puns in minimum allowable conversations. Not being lame, is a huge solution in cracking codes than clothing, automobile bribes, and waging allowance auctions, to prevent defection to second wives or husbands - or in instances of covering up for adults in transition as well.

Normal growing up can be stressful as well : the changes in rent, having to change cities where work beckons, a series of boyfriends making you weekly proposals - ones that aren’t serious don’t crop up as threatening as the really serious ones. And the different things that happen when bad things happen, or what i’d call Inevitability: taxes, theft in foreign countries that lead to stolen credit cards, laptops, passports & driver’s licences. Data loss. And several website crashes. Job shifts Getting fired from your first job. Or what is: getting your first “pink slip”. Is always rough, and being told that your Creative Director will be sick for a week, and you have to fill in. Last minute.

These are a part of growing up. Because when you complain to your
bestie, all hey say is: “Just suck it up, and grow up.”

6/ Sixth: Marriage and its dissolution, Divorce.

A dream wedding - with that wedding dress you got to design, because the designer was your mom’s sister’s best brother’s wife or hush hush lover - ending up in tears, and after 25 years, end up in a brutal 5-year drag of a cross-country “Im keeping the kids, you keep the skis” divorce.

Etcetera.

Will keep you posted. (I haven’t exactly gotten through this yet, at the time of publish.)

7/ Seventh: Having kids. And then they grow up.

Changes are micro, when you have kids.

You create a system, and maintain it with a corporate super (or three) jobs. And what happens is, you keep getting nagged by society, or grandparents, about getting it together - roll, This is 40. - and you feel inconsequential when it gets down to winging it, or swinging it. Because the neighbours are at it. You feel like you have to modernise, and keep up.

(Please.)

Give me my bunny slippers, and jammies and I’m in bed securely - getting it on with Netflix by 10. After my 10-step skincare regimen, and having routines will make everyone feel stabilised, and authorised to live life to the (more-stable-as-yourself) fullest.

8/ Eighth: & All of the above, in the same year.

Having a kid, getting married, changing houses, changing schools, changing lives, changing parents, changing names, changing streets, changing routines, changing uniforms, changing tailors, changing weekend pizza-church-park-seaside stroll routine, changing in-laws, changing spouses, changing best friends, changing circle of friends, changing phones, changing zip codes, changing addresses where friends can find you - and most stressful above all, parents dying (because they loved you unconditionally - now what?!).

And in the same year.

That is an important factor - it’s like a session at the gym that you do everything at once. Or when you had to take extra credit in college - and took everything at once, in overload mode, to cram everything and pass your APE’s like your life depended upon it.

But that’s for another post.

9/ So, the last of the mega-changes: New life

The daunt might actually be just round the corner, whatever the circumstance. But the cause for that last push, might actually be in the changes mentioned above. And as they happen sequentially, the order of events - as they happen, is actually the key to the breakthrough, sherlock. Domino effects, are akin to tumbling like pieces of your life in a strict ordered to a distinct consequence that some shamans attribute to fate - and not more likely to qualify as your immediate environments.

A trio of factors mostly simplified to: past, present and what is it that i want at this distinct point?

(If the answer to the last one is just sushi, then new life might still probably be in the works. Triggered by your preference and time of day.)

Lunch.

And probably, death.

But that’s not a change, nor a pitstop. It’s where everyone goes. The final destination. Where massive changes need no healing, or be subjected to its mandates. Where we lie, is what the worms in future will benefit from its decay and trace of biodiversity, the life that we knew, is no longer. It’s not the Change that ends all changes.

Like Janet said, It’s the End?

**There’s an In-Learning video i recently came across: https://www.linkedin.com/learning/communicating-in-times-of-change/welcome *that helps with times like these.**