To Live Well is to Learn to Adapt to Change

Happy St. Gregory Grassi and Companions Day! How are you celebrating this Saint today? I ask my kids that from time to time and I get the same look every time. I do have one child who looks these up after being asked. As a result, we’ve invented a few small celebrations with the hope of these catching on in popularity in the annals of time. I’m not holding my breath.

You can read more about St. Gregory Grassi and Companions here: https://www.franciscanmedia.org/saint-gregory-grassi-and-companions/

St. Grassi and pals played a large role in sharing the faith throughout China and were martyred during the Boxer Uprising of 1900. How are we embracing the same determination to share our faith in the face of persecution? I’m not asking anyone to look for trouble at all, but it’s a neat perspective to push me to live my faith with simple appreciation for those who died to live theirs.

To live well is to learn to adapt to change. If you don’t adapt with change, the potential for life may not meet the potential set forth by our creator. I feel there are times in my life that I enter a bit of a chrysalis stage. That’s referring to the third stage of the life cycle of a caterpillar. From the outside, a pupa, or chrysalis, looks as if the caterpillar may be resting. However, all the action is taking place on the inside with rapid, life-altering changes. It’s important to have your occasional internal chrysalis stage to make sure we are adapted to thrive in our ever-changing environments.

My previous 18 months have required a lot of internal changes. I’ve experienced changes in my external life that most people may experience over a longer period of time if ever. I’ve battled the tendency to be depressed at losing control of situations I never really had control of in the first place. I better understand, yet still struggle at understanding, appreciation for things I continually take for granted, such as the simple ability to talk, breathe or play baseball with my children.

While I have adapted to a new life missing many of the activities I never thought twice about 18 months ago, there are other currents within my being constantly changing me. For example, my appetite has drastically changed to where certain food or drink does not taste as good as it did over a year ago. My appetite for chasing elaborate pleasures while neglecting to embrace happiness in simplicity has changed. My appreciation for friends that can pick up a conversation where we left off months ago has increased. The fervor I maintained for a strong, faith-filled marriage has turned into a raging forest fire because this is the apex of all my relationships. My internal life is constantly changing as a result of keeping up with a lot of external change.

When was your last “chrysalis stage” where internal changes were occurring? Was anyone else aware of the changes you were experiencing? How did you handle these changes in light of relationships with those closest to you?

We all have stories to share that may impact another in ways that directly benefit them along their journey. We may believe that we live the most plain, vanilla life that no one would be interested in learning about while others live lives worthy of an epic novel. Regardless of where you believe you’d find your story on the shelves of the library of time, stories are made and shared about how the main character (you or I) change to circumstances out of our control and come out a different, hopefully better, version of ourselves.