on change ...

To start I could quote Heraclitus phrase that nothing is constant except change. In Buddhism "annica" describes that impermanence. Even dialectical materialism taught by Engels or Marx thought of this constant state of change. I think we are all in agreement so far in the fact that change is constant.

To address the five W's and one H it is evident that some of them are answered simply from the prior statement, the only difficult one and that I want to address is How? How do we change? specially if change is unavoidable.

First let me talk a little about the unavoidability of change. If it is a fact that we are in a constant state of change what happens when we are simply couch potatoing? is it possible to avoid change? what if I refuse to change? What if I don't want to? ... yup, you got it, it is not possible! change is happening as you read this, and will continue to happen forever. (on a side note someone said that time is nothing but a mere measurement of change, therefore if perfection could be attained then time will also cease to exist, another topic for another day) Whether we acknowledge it or not change is happening.

What about the "direction" of change? up and down? side to side? left to right? oh wait! it seems that change occur on opposite sides always, call it yin and yang, good and evil, light and darkness, intelligence and ignorance, self control and being controlled, freedom and slavery; the issue is that it requires opposition to exist, for change to occur. Even at the gym opposition is required for muscle fibre to break and grow. Also, they all seem to have a common thread, the fact that there is a goal, a final destination, a nirvana, perfection, salvation, enlightenment, or however one wants to call it, the end I will call it. We have opposition and some end needed for this change to be productive let's call it, or utilitarian if you may, active, otherwise is a mere passive act, where we are acted upon and not acting.

How does one know this end? is the question. What is that end? I guess the first step would be to define that "end" otherwise we will be like Alice in Wonderland when she asked The Cat: 

Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?

The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.
Knowing where one wants to go seems to be a starting point if one wants to go somewhere, otherwise it seems we will be going still just not sure where. The urgency of the matter is based not so much on where one wants to go but rather on what we just reflected upon, the fact that no matter whether I figure out where do I want to go or not, I am still going somewhere, even as we speak. It seems to me that it is rather urgent to figure this one out or we will be taken who knows where in this ever changing life.

Change is happening, where are you going? where do you want to end?

“If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”

― Martin Luther King Jr.