It’s IS (not) my job & other reasons (not) TO change (or learn)

change, change management

Image from Doug Ragan's facebook page

I recently wrote a post called It’s not my job & other reasons not to change (or learn).   I thought I’d turn it around for this post.  Won’t you join me?

Here are my reasons to change.  My goal is to hit 50.  I’ll add more as time goes on.  What are yours? Feel free to add them in the comment section.

  1. You have to ask?  Really?
  2. My environment demands it. I live in Africa.  I’m constantly assessing, reassessing, changing & learning.
  3. It’s my job.
  4. How can I ask others to change & learn if I won’t?
  5. It keeps things interesting
  6. To shake things up
  7. To build on what’s working & make it better
  8. It’s exciting
  9. I’m ambitious
  10. It’s in my DNA (& yours)
  11. To keep up
  12. To catch up
  13. To be on the cusp
  14. To explore
  15. For the adventure
  16. The adrenaline learning brings is brain candy to me
  17. It keeps me creative
  18. I can always do better
  19. Because I can
  20. Because I should
  21. Because I want to
  22. It keeps my brain young
  23. To stimulate my brain
  24. It’s mandatory being a parent
  25. It’s mandatory being a woman
  26. It’s mandatory being human
  27. It’s how learning happens
  28. It’s necessary for human development
  29. It beats back resistance (mine included)
  30. It beats back boredom (mine especially)

Over to you change agent.  What would you add?

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53 Responses to “It’s IS (not) my job & other reasons (not) TO change (or learn)”

  1. dolly Hopkins Says:
    February 1st, 2012 at 9:04 am

    Its a big one to embrace change –

  2. Patrick Jobe Says:
    February 21st, 2012 at 1:13 pm

    Hi Lee-Ann:

    Perhaps tearing, breaking, pain, and messes are part and parcel with building, layering, adding to and blending. Change can come in many ways from heart attacks to wind erosion, and – maybe – need not be any of these exclusively. Another metaphor…think of making bread, and the processes that range from your kneeding the dough to the minute chemical reactions that are happening as you do so. It may seem, as you do so, that it is a more inert change involving layering to and adding, but really it is quite a bit more dramatic than that – just on a smaller scale.

    Perhaps I am more mindful of the tearing and exertion metaphors because of whom I am and where I am at in life. I also wonder about life cycles – progress and progressing ultimately to the end of life. Change happening through just being.

    In the end, all those more physical, action-oriented changes of tearing and ripping fibers lead to the changes of layering and building of the muscle that you suggest.

  3. Lee-Anne Ragan Says:
    February 22nd, 2012 at 2:54 am

    Hi Patrick
    Thanks so much for your thoughtful comments. I think you’re bang on. It’s tough though when the expectation is often ‘nice, tidy & neat’ is the way to go. A friend of mine, Vinod Boolell, a judge at the UN (see the to-do post recently which mentions him – first in a series) did a big makeover of his lifestyle based on some major health issues with his son. It caused him to rethink things & as a result, live a much healthier (more fit) life.

    When I think back to some big, messy changes in my life, more often than naught they ended up very positive. It can be hard to see the muscle building (see outside the black clouds) when you’re in the middle of it. It’s only after, upon looking back that I can dissect, probe & take advantage of all the chemical reactions, previously unseen, that were happening when the ‘dough was rising.’

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