Change is Inevitable

Sitting outside, on a cool night, I can hear the stream gushing down the rocks, the cicadas are busy creating music, their tones rising to reach a crescendo and then dropping down. The cool breeze is gently caressing the leaves swaying them to and fro. The mist is slowly making its way to the mountaintops. The tiny crescent moon is playing a game of hide and seek through the clouds. This moment is so beautiful, so perfect, that I feel a tiny wish in my heart, saying if only this could last forever.

But suddenly I realise, silly me. What can be more absurd than a wish for permanence in this ever-changing existence? But isn’t this something we humans always desire for? That our happiness stays forever?

Looking around me, I try to look for something which is constant and hasn’t changed ever. The stream flowing by is ever-changing. The water that is flowing by is never the same. And as the water weathers away the rocks, the rocks are undergoing a very slow transformation, but they are changing. The mist is moving, the clouds are changing shape. The flowers are blooming slowly and then withering away. Our bodies are growing old every second, even though we are unaware of it.

Even the nights are gently waning into the day, and days are turning to nights with every passing moment. Seasons are changing from summer to winter. Our earth is constantly moving around the sun. The sun itself is changing from minute to minute. So nothing, practically nothing, in existence has remained unchanged. Everything is undergoing either a slow or a rapid change, but nevertheless a change.

Then why is it that we expect our happy moments to stay forever? Our life is also like changing seasons, sometimes sunny, sometimes rainy, sometimes cold and wintry. After all, the only constant aspect of existence is change!

The only way to live is to embrace this ever-changing aspect of existence. Only by learning to accept wholeheartedly the change that each passing moment brings, can we learn to live each moment. Maybe by learning to accept change, someday we will come face to face with the divine force behind the change, the constant beneath the continuous flow of life.