Quotes & Sayings About Difficulty Of Change

The greater the difficulty of the change, the greater the need for enchantment. Factors that cause friction include expense, risk, and "politics." If a change is a big deal, then it's a big deal to make it happen. — Guy Kawasaki

Difficulty relaxing Insomnia Impatience Taking on too much responsibility Recent major life change (marriage, divorce, birth of child, death of close relative, purchase of home, new job, loss of job, etc.) Irritability Tension headaches Sense of isolation from others Difficulty delegating — Hyla Cass

Got nothing out of it. They either knew the lessons and were already living them, or, more commonly, they thought they already knew everything and didn't want to learn. They couldn't see why so many others were benefitting from it. "When one of our senior executives, who was having difficulty adapting, said the story was a waste of time, other people kidded him saying they knew which character he was in the story - meaning the one who learned nothing new and did not change." "What's the story?" Angela asked. "It's called, Who Moved My Cheese?" The group laughed. "I think I like it already," Carlos said. "Would you tell us the story? Maybe we can get something from it." "Sure," Michael replied. "I'd be happy to-it doesn't take long." And so he began: — Spencer Johnson

Much of the difficulty in attempting to restructure American and other societies arises form this resistance by groups with vested interests in the status quo. Significant change might require those who are now high in the hierarchy to move downward many steps. This seems to them undesirable and its resisted. — Carl Sagan

There was also no character arc. Change only comes when we face the difficulty of reality head-on. Fantasy changes nothing, which is why, once we're done fantasizing, it feels like a bankrupt story. — Donald Miller

As I said, you have mistaken me for another. London is full of drab little peahens, sir. Now, then, I'm leaving," she said in a huff.
"To change?" he asked, unable to stop from goading her.
"To write a poem for my toast," she snapped. "And you may suffer, for I will not help you with yours."
"No need, darling," Matthew drawled, his words intending to push her away.
"I doubt you know a suitable word that will rhyme with fuck. "
"Stuck," she said, turning to face him. "For two days, my lord. We are stuck with one another. Let us make the best of it."
"And how do you propose we do that?"
"By giving each other wide berth. We will not stand together, we will not talk to one another and we will most certainly not look at one another."
"No problem from this quarter."
"Good. You may be assured that it will be no difficulty for me, either."
-Matthew and Jane — Charlotte Featherstone

This was not to say, however, that she did not long, at times, for some greater change, that she did not experience some of those exceptional moments when one thirsts for something other than what is, and when those who, through lack of energy or imagination, are unable to generate any motive power in themselves, cry out, as the clock strikes or the postman knocks, for something new, even if it is worse, some emotion, some sorrow; when the heartstrings, which contentment has silenced, like a harp laid by, yearn to be plucked and sounded again by some hand, however rough, even if it should break them; when the will, which has with such difficulty won the right to indulge without let or hindrance in its own desires and woes, would gladly fling the reins into the hands of imperious circumstance, however cruel. — Marcel Proust

Olivia had changed so much since then. She had changed in ways she would never have been able to anticipate. She had become the kind of person who was barely able to get out of bed in the morning without buckling beneath the tidal pull of the planets. — Kevin Brockmeier

I do not underestimate the difficulty of the challenge that global climate change presents to us. It will take a significant effort and the best talent and technology we have to solve the problem. — Federico Pena

Because of our selfishness and inclination toward personal comfort and convenience, we'd rather not have to deal with constant change and uncertainty. We have difficulty reconciling the goodness of God with the mystery of his ways. — Chris Hodges

Many will, no doubt, prefer to retain old unsystematic names as far as possible, but it is easy to see that the desire to avoid change may carry us too far in this direction; it will undoubtedly be very inconvenient to the present generation of chemists to abandon familiar and cherished names, but nevertheless it may be a wise course to boldly face the difficulty, rather than inflict on coming generations a partially illogical and unsystematic nomenclature. — Henry Edward Armstrong

You must want to change. It sounds simple, but it's obviously not. If things were easy, then something would be wrong. You must make a firm decision that this is what you want. If you want to change, if you want to free yourself from a depressed, mediocre mindset, then you must make a conscious decision to do something about it, and stick to it. If you don't want to change, nothing will help you. Years of endless work will be lost on you unless you internalize your strength and push forward. It is how hard you push in times of difficulty that will prove your strength. — Leigh Hershkovich

The effects of this change were momentous. Truth was no longer to be ascertained by consulting authority, but by inward meditation. There was a tendency, quickly developed, towards anarchism in politics, and, in religion, towards mysticism, which had always fitted with difficulty into the framework of Catholic orthodoxy. There came to be not one Protestantism, but a multitude of sects; not one philosophy opposed to scholasticism, but as many as there — Bertrand Russell

Self. Through a caring relationship with ourselves we learn self-nurturing - the ability to love ourselves and see ourselves as one resource we can turn to during times of difficulty. It's through a relationship with ourselves that we learn the most about change, either positive or negative. As we watch and interact with ourselves, we see our vast potential for change. It's through a caring relationship with ourselves that we learn to be caring and patient with others. The relationship we have with ourselves is carried in some form to all our other relationships. — Craig Nakken

We have trouble estimating dramatic, exponential change. We cannot conceive that a piece of paper folded over 50 times could reach the sun. There are abrupt limits to the number of cognitive categories we can make and the number of people we can truly love and the number of acquaintances we can truly know. We throw up our hands at a problem phrased in an abstract way, but have no difficulty at all solving the same problem rephrased as a social dilemma. All of these things are expressions of the peculiarities of the human mind and heart, a refutation of the notion that the way we function and communicate and process information is straightforward and transparent. It is not. It is messy and opaque. — Malcolm Gladwell

The world is impermanent. [All things change. Knowing this helps you see the end of any difficulty and thereby have hope.] — Ramakrishna

Getting hold of the difficulty deep down is what is hard. Because if it is grasped near the surface it simply remains the difficulty it was. It has to be pulled out by the roots; and that involves our beginning to think about these things in a new way. The change is as decisive as, for example, that from the alchemical to the chemical way of thinking. The new way of thinking is what is so hard to establish. Once the new way of thinking has been established, the old problems vanish; indeed they become hard to recapture. For they go with our way of expressing ourselves and, if we clothe ourselves in a new form of expression, the old problems are discarded along with the old garment. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

Try to meditate as you would engage in a good conversation: maintain a sense of openness, without judgment or anticipating what is going to be said next. As I already noted (but almost can't emphasize too much), having an agenda prevents you from observing objectively and accepting things as they are. When you first sit down to meditate, briefly check in with yourself. Don't engage in a long monologue about your state of mind; just see how you feel, literally. There's a good chance, especially if you're new to this, you'll find an uneasiness that comes from wanting to do something else or from hoping you'll get some kind of payoff from meditating. Observe what that wanting feels like without trying to change it. Just accept that this feeling or feelings is reality for you at this moment, and that's okay - this too will pass. If you're finding you're having a lot of difficulty concentrating, it can be helpful to check in this way again. — Marshall Glickman

Change is like the skin peeling off of a snake. It is slow. It is sticky. And sometimes you have to rub against a hard place to pull yourself through it. But in the end, you realize that it was worth it all to get the the new place and new person you have become. — Stella Payton

This whole idea of visibility by the public creates a pretty powerful lever. In the new transparency era, you are able to make change you would otherwise have difficulty making. It's no longer possible for somebody just to bury the problem. It's the reason why things like WikiLeaks are important. — Tim O'Reilly

Accept the difficulty of what you cannot yet change. But do not accept the impossibility of ever changing it. — Aubrey De Grey

The real difficulty is with the vast wealth and power in the hands of the few and the unscrupulous who represent or control capital. Hundreds of laws of Congress and the state legislatures are in the interest of these men and against the interests of workingmen. These need to be exposed and repealed. All laws on corporations, on taxation, on trusts, wills, descent, and the like, need examination and extensive change. This is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people no longer. It is a government of corporations, by corporations, and for corporations. — Rutherford B. Hayes

I know that most men - not only those considered clever, but even those who are very clever, and capable of understanding most difficult scientific, mathematical, or philosophic problems - can very seldom discern even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as to oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions they have formed, perhaps with much difficulty - conclusions of which they are proud, which they have taught to others, and on which they have built their lives. — Leo Tolstoy

I try to believe everything I read in the newspapers, but I had difficulty with last week's account of the London vagrant who was found, after death, to be carrying £1,500 in small change in his socks.
My reason for doubting the story is that I, too, like to carry small change in my socks, but I have found that with more that £15 or £20 worth it becomes impossible to walk. — Auberon Waugh

Later, he would famously write that the will to believe is the most important ingredient in creating belief in change. And that one of the most important methods for creating that belief was habits. Habits, he noted, are what allow us to "do a thing with difficulty the first time, but soon do it more and more easily, and finally, with sufficient practice, do it semi-mechanically, or with hardly any consciousness at all." Once we choose who we want to be, people grow "to the way in which they have been exercised, just as a sheet of paper or a coat, once creased or folded, tends to fall forever afterward into the same identical folds. — Charles Duhigg

I had a recent delivery of new fashion plates from Paris, and you hardly glanced at the hairstyles. My husband tells me you are still having difficulty controlling the change. And your cravat has been tied very simply of late, even for evening events. — Gail Carriger

Those who can't imagine change reveal the deficits of their imaginations, not the difficulty of change. — Nelson Mandela

I write books and either people read them or they don't read them. The rise of Facebook or e-books doesn't change the difficulty level of writing sentences and thinking up new ideas. — Colson Whitehead

[Meditation] trains us to be with a painful experience in the moment, without adding imagined distress and difficulty. If we look closely at it, the pain is bound to change, and that's as true of a headache as it is of a heartache: the discomfort oscillates; there are beats of rest between moments of unpleasantness. When we discover firsthand that pain isn't static, that it's a living, changing system, it doesn't seem as solid or insurmountable as it did at first. — Sharon Salzberg

What is called storing money is a way of using wealth. The uncertainty of the future makes it seem advisable to hold a larger or smaller part of one's possessions in a form that will facilitate a change from one way of using wealth to another, or transition from the ownership of one good to that of another, in order to preserve the opportunity of being able without difficulty to satisfy urgent demands that may possibly arise in the future for goods that will have to be obtained by way of exchange. — Ludwig Von Mises

The price of change is measured by our will and courage, our persistence, in the face of difficulty. — Peter Block

Acceptance is not a state of passivity or inaction. I am not saying you can't change the world, right wrongs, or replace evil with good. Acceptance is, in fact, the first step to successful action. If you don't fully accept a situation precisely the way it is, you will have difficulty changing it. Moreover, if you don't fully accept the situation, you will never really know if the situation should be changed. — Peter McWilliams

The increasing technicality of the terminology employed is also a serious difficulty. It has become necessary to learn an extensive vocabulary before a book in even a limited department of science can be consulted with much profit. This change, of course, has its advantages for the initiated, in securing precision and concisement of statement; but it tends to narrow the field in which an investigator can labour, and it cannot fail to become, in the future, a serious impediment to wide inductive generalisations. — Thomas George Bonney