Change

December 2023 

Change doesn’t wait for approval. It doesn't queue politely like a citizen in a ration line. It comes in silence or in ruin, but never on time. The world praises patience because it feels safe, because it soothes the ones who fear the turning of the tide. Patience is a lullaby we sing to delay what we cannot prevent. But fire doesn’t listen. A forest never bargains with flame. It yields, and in the yielding, something else begins.

It’s the same with people. We’ve come to believe in the slow fix. Routines, daily affirmations, the neatly tabulated life. There are schedules for self-improvement, calendars for becoming whole. But the truth never followed a plan. The truth enters like a bullet, fast, irreversible, and never where you expected. When it comes, it doesn’t negotiate. It burns. And you either step through it or you don’t.

Real change is not the reward of discipline. It isn’t the prize at the end of a checklist. It begins with something simpler, and harder. A refusal. A quiet, exhausted turning away from what no longer rings true. That turning doesn’t need courage. Only necessity. You don’t act because you’re brave. You act because there’s no other option left.

People talk about belief and hope as if they’re virtues. But belief is a borrowed coat. Hope is a story you tell to avoid saying what you really mean. The truth doesn’t need dressing. It doesn’t care if you’re ready. It arrives, and it stays. It’s not the sort of thing you can carry. It carries you, whether you want it to or not.

In modern life, we’ve become fond of frameworks. Systems for transformation. Models for meaning. There are journals that promise insight and routines that promise peace. But the truth never came on schedule. The truth doesn’t attend your workshop. It doesn’t speak in bullet points. It simply shows you what can no longer continue, and waits to see if you’ll still pretend.

Some think they can manufacture awakening. Package it. Monetize it. But the real thing doesn’t follow technique. It begins where technique ends. You can rehearse peace. You can repeat mantras. But when something deep inside you moves, not as idea, not as effort, but as certainty, none of it matters anymore. You move because you must. And when you don’t, you rot.

The beginning of all true change is not knowledge, it’s unknowing. Not answers, but the bitter taste of the question that won’t go away. Not improvement, but the quiet collapse of everything that once felt solid. What do I not understand? That’s not philosophy. It’s the crack that lets the storm in.

And so the task is not to add more to your life. It is to watch what falls away when you stop lying. It is to stand, not because you’re aiming to evolve, but because you can’t sit still a moment longer. It’s not some higher ideal pulling you forward. It’s the weight of what you can no longer bear.

None of this is self-help. It isn’t therapeutic. It won’t leave you feeling better about your future. This is demolition. This is the raw flame. There’s no manual for fire. You just learn to stop pretending it won’t reach you.