Journaling project, Day 11

Everything gets a bit uncomfortable when it’s time to change. That’s just a part of the growth process. Things will get better. Be patient and remind yourself: Life never gets easier, you just get stronger.

How has the discomfort you’ve felt in the past helped you grow? How can you better accept the discomfort you presently feel?

It has been suggested that I ignore the intro texts and just focus on the prompts because the texts seem to be written for someone who is not me. So let's try that for today's prompt.

Growth from discomfort reminds me of the 'how do pearls grow' - kind of like an accidental side-effect. I tend to think of "growth" in terms of striving to achieve my goals and "change" in terms of getting rid of discomfort. When I run groups I always try to have, or delegate someone to have, a vision. Usually that's a "design vision" as in what things ought to end up looking like and behaving like. But a vision, in general. The purpose of this vision is to help us distinguish between "change" and "progress". The former is easy; the latter is hard. And if you don't have a shared understanding of where you ought to be going it's very easy to confuse the two. Just because things are different and - to use this prompt's ideas - discomfort is less does not mean that you've grown or gotten closer to your goals or vision.

As for accepting the discomfort I currently feel... well, I'm just gonna let Dylan Thomas say it for me:
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

I used to know the poem by heart but have mostly forgotten it now. I've never been the kind to go gently, nor to tolerate discomfort about things I care about.