Change… what is it made of?

Remember a few years ago when Barack Obama, presidential hopeful and current leader of this great nation, was preaching about change?  Yes, we can change!  Yes, we can!  Well I certainly do.  Now, I’m not going to debate politics here, but I will say that I am unbelievably exhausted… not tired, but exhausted from political ads.  These people are calling my cell phone to preach at me and tell me how they can change things.  The truth of the matter is.. no one is going to change anything, they are too busy arguing over who is right and who is wrong.  But really, we are supposed to vote for the person who is less of a monster than the other, yet still voting for a monster.

I will not be going to the polls this year to vote for anyone.  I’m exercising my right to NOT vote for any of these people simply because I don’t think either of you will do the job right and I don’t want to be ashamed when I have to answer “Yes, I voted for him/her.” when they inevitably abuse their power, corrupt the system, and lie to the people.  What I am absolutely certain of is that something needs to change and one man or woman just can’t do it.  You all know what Gandhi said right?  Be the change you wish to see in the world.  Does that mean we need to change ourselves instead of relying on others to change the world for us?  I think so.

I wanted to let you in on a little secret.  Well, it isn’t a secret, but most people don’t know about it unless they have been therapy or the like.  When someone wants to change something about themselves or really make a change of any sort they will go through a series of stages.  There are 5 distinct stages; pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, and maintenance.  I will outline them for you really quick like:

1) Pre-contemplation – This is a the first stage which isn’t really much of a stage at all because the person has no indication or intention to change a behavior.  They may even be unaware or “underaware” of their problems.

2) Contemplation – This is the stage when the person first becomes aware that a problem exists and they begin seriously think about fixing said problem, but aren’t really committed to it just yet.

3)  Preparation – Pretty much just like it sounds.  A person in this stage may have made unsuccessful attempts at change in the past few months or they are intending to take action very soon.

4)  Action – Again, just like it sounds.  A person will begin to modify their behavior, experiences, or environment in order to overcome the problem.  The trick here is essentially “easier said than done”, right?  Yep.  This stage requires a great deal of energy and commitment.  But it’s totally worth it.

5)  Maintenance – You guessed it, the person maintains their new behavior, experience, or environment.

So… first, in regards to our country, what stage of change to you think our leader’s are in?  Totally subjective question.  I won’t answer it for the sake of my keeping this post less than 2 miles long.  Aside from our leaders… is there something that you would like to change about our country?  Do you want to change things?  I’m with Gandhi.  I will be the change I wish to see in the world.  I hope that you will be too.  I feel like I will be in the action stage for most of my life and we can only get to maintenance if we all work together.  Help me be the change we need and lets get to maintenance… this action stuff is wearing me out.

Also to all of you politicians out there… get your act together because one day, you will have to answer to your voters.  And one day, we won’t let you get away with the things that you do.  We can make change without you… just wait and see.