Fear of Change

Fear of change is what keeps us stuck in dead-end jobs, relationships, or towns. It’s understandable that many err on the side of caution, but being understandable isn’t the same as being good. If fear of change is coming between you and a life of joy, freedom, and fulfilment, this article is for you.

I’ve written and spoken a lot about courage in the past, but not so much about fear. This was because I like to focus on the positive side — what do we want more of? — rather than the negative side — what do we hope to avoid? As Garth Stein writes in his wonderful book, The Art of Racing in the Rain, your car goes where your eyes go. In other words, put your attention on what you want, rather than what you don’t want.

However, there seems to be a lot of fear in the world right now, of various kinds, so I thought I would write a mini-series of blogs about fear, starting with fear of change. I’ll suggest some possible causes, and attempt to offer a solution.

So what causes fear of change? There are many factors, no doubt. Here are three:

Evolutionary Biology

Fear of change is very natural. Evolutionary biology would seem likely to select for not doing things you haven’t done before, and especially not doing things that nobody has done before.