Living with Change.

Tom Peters published Thriving on Chaos in 1987 and I read it shortly afterwards. It's an excellent book aimed at the business community and Tom Peters explains how rapid and unpredictable change, i.e. chaos, is a way of life, which businesses must accept. Indeed, he urges managers not to fight change, not just to cope with change, but THRIVE on it. Regard life's unpredictability as an opportunity for constantly seeking innovative solutions to highly complex problems. Now that's a good inspirational tonic to guide any business leader and it certainly had an effect on my thinking. In particular, I found it useful to introduce changes just for the hell of it, not just in my business environment but also with day-to-day chores. For example, on the domestic front, I used to vary the route I took to work in the morning, break fixed eating and drinking routines, change my hairstyle, and change other habits that had become a way of life. The object of the exercise was to take me out of my various comfort zones but I must admit I didn't always feel better for the experiences! So at work and play, change was the order of the day - how's that for a catchy poetic adage?!

Life moves on and now that I am not thriving with the cut-and-thrust of the corporate pantomime, you might think more stability was the order of the day. Forget it! In recent times my life continues to change but not as a result of planning, indeed the opposite - serendipity! Since Sandie and I got married seven and a half years ago, an event which in itself was serendipitous, we have lived in four homes, including a boat on the River Thames, two of which we actually named Serendipity. The same name was used for a business that we created in Turkey, which was difficult to explain to the authorities because there doesn't appear to be a literal translation of serendipity into Turkish. During this time we have inherited a family of two dogs and a cat, whilst pursuing a challenging lifestyle with a healthy balance of physical and intellectual activities. The main difference between our current self-employed status versus our pre-marital employed status, is that changes in our personal lives are not planned now to the same degree as previously. I have no doubt that if I am writing a post in seven years time, I will be able to recall many other unplanned and hopefully serendipitous experiences.

I know I am very fortunate to have partner who has, as one of her many attributes, a love of change. In fact, her desire to play 'musical chairs' continues in our home. Rarely a week goes by without something moving! It can be a picture, a clock, a mirror, an item of furniture or indeed, complete room changes! The lounge has become the dining room and vice versa, the main bedroom has become the spare bedroom and vice versa, and so it goes on....but it's fun! I must admit that sometimes my brain has difficulty keeping pace with these domestic changes, firstly noticing them and after they have registered, adapting to the new arrangements. The waste paper bin was concealed in a cupboard in the kitchen. Sandie moved it to a different cupboard and for weeks afterwards I kept going to the wrong cupboard! It's moved again but it's now not concealed so I don't have a problem. More recently, I went to my 'normal' cabinet for a pair of underpants, only to find a drawer full of bras and knickers!! Two items of furniture had been interchanged. Last week I conducted a simple experiment. I swapped two furniture pieces in the lounge and dining room. It took Sandie an hour to spot the change, longer than I had anticipated, but she was busy doing housework during that time. I explained it was an experiment to observe how long it would take her to spot the difference, to which her response was "I'm only trying to make the place better". Eureka! I learnt more from that statement than from observing her reaction time to my silly experiment. Her continual desire for change is actually an aspiration for improvement, so she THRIVES on change.

Not all change is serendipity. One of the synonyms for 'serendipity' is 'happy accident', which can be translated into Turkish! The massacres on Syria, the disease and starvation in Africa, can hardly be described as serendipitous. But that doesn't mean we can't all learn something from these and other disastrous events. We can't change history but we can all try "to make the place better". The only thing we can predict with any certainty is that things will change. So we have to live with it and might as well thrive on it!