The Case for Waffling

We are home! Our “plan” was to travel only halfway home from grandson Matt’s yesterday.  We even had a reservation at an RV park for last night.  But we changed our minds!  We cancelled the reservation! We drove all the way home instead!  Why is it that changing one’s mind can be so difficult?  We spent several hours trying to “make up our minds” whether to go on home or stick with the “plan.”  

The world and our view of it is constantly changing and evolving; circumstances and situations never remain static.  Why is it then that we have difficulty changing our minds even about the simplest of things?  Why do we get locked into a plan and seem unable (unwilling) to budge or deviate from it even when everything else around us is in flux?  

We don’t like people who “waffle (fail to make up one’s mind).”  Shouldn’t we all be Wafflers?  (The truth of the matter is that we must waffle if we want to keep up with a waffling world). We pretend we live in a straightforward, a static world, but we know this isn’t true.  Every circumstance and every issue is changing constantly.  Why can’t we practice the intellectual openness which changing one’s mind requires?  Why is changing one’s mind such a struggle for us and particularly for seniors.  

Why are we so stubborn?  Why do we still hang on to our answers/decisions of yesterday?  Why does the simple act of re-opening a settled question to re-examine it seem to require such courage and energy?   

Perhaps we become attached to our “mindset” (our answers/plans/decisions) just like we do our possessions.  It is not just our answer to a question, an issue, or circumstance, it is OUR ANSWER.  We become emotionally biased  in favor of our “mindset.” We can’t change our minds because our answer has become part of who we are.  Any threat to our “mindset” feels like a threat to us. 

Looking out my study window I am keenly aware that the grass must be mowed today because rain is in the forecast for tomorrow.  I’m mighty glad we could transcend our “plan” (answer, mindset, whatever word works) of yesterday so that I can mow the grass today.  I’m glad we waffled on our plan and hope we can do it more often.

We will get on the road again before long--
unless we change our minds.