Why Is It Terrifying to Change?

There’s a scene in The Matrix when Neo has a chance to go back to his old life…

After being tortured & interrogated by the mysterious government Agents, he’s picked up in a car by Trinity and his new contacts — still largely strangers to Neo at this point — who pull a gun on him “for their protection.”

Unsure if he can trust them, he opens the car door to get out…

TRINITY: “Please Neo, you have to trust me…”

NEO: “Why?”

TRINITY: “Because you’ve been down there, Neo. You know that road. You know exactly where it ends, and I know that’s not where you want to be.”

Then, Neo decides to close the door and stay in the car, as they pull off toward his red-pilled destiny. 💊

In real life, we all have moments like this, too…

We can decide to continue living life as it is, or we can make a change.

But why can change be so scary? Why can it feel like a huge risk?

At its basic level, it’s about 1 thing:

Survival.

Whatever is going on in life… whether what you’re doing is making you happy or not…

The fact that you’re still living sends a subtle message to your subconscious:

“Since you’re still alive, you must be safe. So, don’t risk death by changing.”

Our minds are hard-wired toward survival — NOT toward happiness, fulfillment, or growth…

But here’s the challenge:

Our souls NEED those other things, too.

Tony Robbins’ 6 Human Needs framework is a good way of looking at this:

1. Certainty: Assurance you can avoid pain and gain pleasure

2. Uncertainty/Variety: The need for the unknown, change, new stimuli

3. Significance: Feeling unique, important, special or needed

4. Connection/Love: A strong feeling of closeness or union with someone or something

5. Growth: An expansion of capacity, capability or understanding

6. Contribution: A sense of service and focus on helping, giving to and supporting others

Notice that certainty is #1 on this list, and it deserves to be there because — based on most people’s actions — they prioritize it over everything else.

I found this old quote by horror writer H.P. Lovecraft to help explain why: "The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown."

Ultimately, we rely on our 5 senses to survive, so when we can’t yet perceive something through our senses (a.k.a. the unknown), we can’t begin to know what’s safe vs. what’s a threat.

But…

Any significant change comes packaged together with uncertainty.

So how do we reconcile this?

Maybe it’s good to look at the change NOT only as a risk…

But instead, if we choose not to change, then we’re actually denying ourselves of our other needs — including uncertainty itself.

We can’t grow into a bigger, better future — filled with EVERYTHING we need — without letting go of our comfortable past patterns.

So, will you survive on the basic, vanilla meal of certainty?

Or if we accept that certainty is actually an illusion, and that time continues changing the world around us (whether we feel “ready” or not)…

Will you, instead, feast on the full-course menu of life?

Michael McGovern

The Wildman Path

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