Good morning, digital neighbors! Happy Monday and the twelfth week of autumn. Autumn now feels like an afterthought: the trees are bare, the wind is biting, and it seems winter has already moved in for good. Autumn has run through all its changes, and winter has settled in ahead of its astrological start date. Last week we reflected on wisdom; this week I thought we could look at some quotes and thoughts about change.

As modern people, we’re predisposed to see change as inherently good or positive. I think that bias comes from our fascination with technology and its relentless advances. I’m not knocking technology at all—it has undeniably made our world larger and our opportunities more abundant in countless ways. Yet every gain in life comes with some loss. If you doubt that, just think of the things we lament having lost in this current chapter of life, or the nostalgia (or at least wistful longing) many of us feel when we look back.

Change itself is constant, but directed, thoughtful change is not guaranteed. There is just as much chance that change will be haphazard or reckless as there is that it will be deliberate and wise. I’d argue humanity’s historical track record leans far more toward the haphazard side. So many of our biggest shifts have come as unintended consequences of decisions that gave little or no thought to what would be sacrificed for the sake of a particular gain. We march forward assuming that whatever comes next will somehow, inevitably, will be for the best.

I often think of the old cartoon character Mr. Magoo, who blundered through life leaving a trail of destruction in his wake, completely oblivious to the chaos he caused. I’m not suggesting we become Luddites, but we ought to question changes more rigorously—trying to envision both the best- and worst-case outcomes—as part of any serious discernment process. Enough Monday-morning babble from me. More on change tomorrow. Off to some quotes and a morning photo. Blessed Monday friends, roll with the changes!

Change is no modern invention. It is as old as time and as unlikely to disappear. It has always to be counted on as of the essence of human experience. - James Rowland Angell

Much of the social history of the Western world, over the past three decades, has been a history of replacing what worked with what sounded good. – Thomas Sowell - From various essays and Controversial Essays (2002).

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter into another! -  Anatole France

Winter sun in Switzerland - Oleg Demakov - Unsplash