When Business is Familiar, but Different
Change happens regardless so it’s necessary to bend with it as it comes.
Being committed allows me to bend with flexibility where needed. Being attached keeps me rigid. Just as a tree will topple if it does not sway with the wind, being attached will create turmoil in my business.
I woke up to a chill in the air this morning. As I stood on the back porch in my sweatshirt with a cup of coffee I wondered if I’ve always cherished the first days of cool mornings like this.
I most certainly celebrate the first days of fall mornings each year, yet this moment felt different.
This morning as I stood in my slippers I was noticing the day in a different way. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but the quiet arrival of the cool morning air has stuck with me. It’s familiar, yet different.
I was visiting with my 92 and a half year old neighbor earlier this week (she tells me at her age you start counting the halves again because they’re worth celebrating…or cursing, depending on the day). I enjoy our walks together because she’s full of wisdom and spunk! She’s always pointing out “the house that so-and-so used to live in” or “the business that used to be in that spot”, “the dirt road that used to go thru here” or saying “this is new — they added it in 1989”.
I love learning the history and yet in the midst of our walk she pointed out that we are living history in the moment we’re in right now. “Look”, she said, “you’ll be talking about the brown house that used to be there before the new condos went up”. Shortly after we walked past a set of duplexes being torn down for a new set of condos as well. She’s right. Our city is perpetually changing.
It is familiar, yet different.
As I asked Velma if she enjoys seeing the change, she said “well, change happens regardless so I like to bend with it as it comes”.
Bend with it. What an interesting way to think about change. This idea reminds me of trees. How they are firmly rooted, but they need to sway in the wind in order to remain upright.
It is this way in business too: the need to remain rooted, but flexible. I find myself checking in constantly with my vision. Am I committed to the path I’m on or am I attached to it?
There’s a difference.
Being committed allows me to bend with flexibility where needed. Being attached keeps me rigid. Just as a tree will topple if it does not sway with the wind, being attached will create turmoil in my business.
Attachment sets the expectation that things will never change. Ideas will never evolve, the economy will never shift, needs will never change. Which we know certainly isn’t true. Change is always happening.
So, my role is to remain rooted, but flexible. Committed, but not attached.
What feels familiar, yet different for you these days? Where can you be rooted, but flexible?
Perhaps we can take a lesson from Velma and bend with the change that comes.