Stasis is staying the same, staying exactly where you are, where you're comfortable. It is familiar and safe, comforting and secure. You know what's going to happen, you know it's going to be the same as last time. It's family traditions. It's fish and chips every Friday. It's taking the dog on the same walk every morning. It's taking the same route to work every day. It's going to the same supermarket and buying the same items each week. It's reassuring, affirming, relaxing in a way that makes you feel like you're in control.
Stasis is also boredom and apathy. It's being stuck in a rut. It's asking him to put the toilet seat down over and again without him remembering to do it. It's the same arguments every family gathering. Stasis is tedium, repeating the same tasks at work every day, eating left-over Sunday roast every Monday, knowing your commute so well you can do it with your eyes closed and wishing you were doing something else. Stasis is itchy feet, tear your hair out, restlessness. It's dissatisfaction, a nibbling, insistent urge to do more or different, to go somewhere new, try something you've never done before. Too much stasis can drive you into change.
Change is the opposite, the other end of the scale. It's new and unfamiliar, scary and uncertain. You end up questioning everything. You don't know whether you're coming or going, which way is up, which is the right decision. You feel overwhelmed, confused, anxious. Change is chaos, flux, disruption, turbulence. It shakes you up, rattles things loose. It's uncomfortable, outside your comfort zone.
Change is also excitement and adventure. It's trying new foods, going to new places, meeting new people. Change involves opening your eyes, your mind. It requires confidence, trust that everything will turn out alright in the end. Change is learning and growing, metamorphosis and transformation. It's a sense of achievement, of a challenge faced, a new skill mastered. Change is an inevitable part of nature and an inescapable fact of time.
As the seasons change, summer now sliding into autumn, we're reminded of the importance of balance. In a couple of days it is the equinox, when day and night are equal length (on Tuesday 22nd September). So in the midst of change, it's nice to pull on an old woolly jumper and bake a favourite recipe. Like in so many aspects of life, balance is the important thing to remember when considering stasis vs change. Too much of either is unhelpful, both are necessary.
