Have you ever wanted to hide under a rock when you knew a change was coming? Or have you ever avoided people that were driving change because you didn’t want the change to happen? Or, have you ever participated in a conversation where you intentionally didn’t bring up a subject because you knew it would lead to talk of change? If you have ever done any of these things, you have tried to be evasive to change. If you try to be evasive when change comes you are prolonging the inevitable.
Who tries to be evasive to change?
Almost everyone has been or will try to be evasive to change. Whether you are a leader, a follower, or someone in between, you have probably tried to be evasive to change even if you try to do all you can to accept change and embrace it.
Change happens whether you like it or not. It is very easy, however, to be evasive to change. When you are evasive to change, you probably think that it will prolong the change. In actuality, however, it just makes the change more difficult. When you are evasive you are in denial over the change.
So what is wrong with being evasive to change?
Three reasons why it is not good to be evasive to change are that when you are evasive to change, it (1) hinders your progress, (2) gives a bad attitude about change, and (3) creates a stumbling block for others implementing change.
1. Being evasive hinders your progress. When you are evasive, you waste a lot of energy fighting a battle you won’t win. Rather than except the change and move forward, you try to avoid it long enough that it will go away. Since change does not go away, you are wasting energy fighting it.
Your time could be better spent accepting the change and getting involved with the change. By getting involved, you take an active role in making things better. This allows you to be part of the solution.
2. Being evasive gives you a bad attitude about change. When you try to be evasive to change, it almost always gives you a bad attitude. Anger and frustration will build up until you can’t hold it anymore. What happens from there? At the very least, you will probably talk to others about it to express your frustrations. Your attitude will get worse the more you talk about it until you finally quit or realize that your bad attitude is a poison inside of you.
Until you realize that you need to change your attitude, you won’t be able move forward. Once you have this realization and change your attitude, it will likely take extra time to get involved because you will have to go in a completely new direction. You will then realize that it would have been much better if you had not had the bad attitude in the first place.
3. Being evasive creates a stumbling block for others implementing change. When you are evasive, you make change more difficult for the person implementing the change. Change is hard to implement in the first place, so do you really want to make it more difficult? If your answer is, “Yes”, please read point number two. If no, then do your best to find out more about it, accept it and take an active role in it. By doing so, life will be much easier for you and those around you.
Be proactive with change
Change can be very hard to accept. From personal experience, I have had times where I had to reflect long and hard before I could accept change. However, once I accepted it and made myself part of the solution rather than try to be evasive, I had the opportunity to make my voice heard.
Have you seen people try to be evasive to change? How did it end for them? Did they have a good outcome or was it painful until they accepted it? How have you helped people to accept change rather than be evasive? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below!
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