The Flip Side by Flip Flippen

Author:Flip Flippen [FLIPPEN, FLIP]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SEL021000
ISBN: 9780446504836
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2007-12-06T05:00:00+00:00

12 Killer Constraint #8:

Turtles (Resistant to Change)

A Tale of Two Wives

I know two couples who have made differing choices about their lives. One couple, Mike and Valerie Smith, has raised three bright, artistically gifted children. My wife and I have been part of their lives over the last few years as they have chosen to walk through some challenging times. One day Mike and Valerie decided they wanted to leave their comfortable careers and move to another country to work with a relief program.

They discussed it with the rest of the family, and although there were a lot of questions and uncertainties to work through, the decision was finally made to go. The family packed up their modest belongings and moved five thousand miles away from family and friends to begin a new life in a country with a different language and very different customs. We stayed in touch with them because we were quite interested in the work they were doing as well as the people they were working with.

On our first visit to see them overseas, we noticed that Valerie never left the house. We also noticed that she didn’t drive, so the only time she was able to go anywhere was when Mike took her out for errands. Her life was centered around her family, which of course is a good thing if it is not hindering other areas that need some attention. When the topic came up, you could tell Valerie felt quite comfortable focusing all her energies at home.

The problem was that Mike couldn’t do his community-based work effectively without her becoming a more outgoing person. His work really did require that Valerie be part of it in a more active way. When this was discussed you could see her visible resistance to it. It wasn’t that Valerie wasn’t supportive of Mike’s mission or that she didn’t love people or see the need to be more involved in the community. In fact, Valerie had wanted to serve in this way since she was a child, and she had already worked with Mike in other countries.

It all boiled down to one thing—a personal constraint. Valerie didn’t like change. The thought of meeting new people, and hosting them in her home, and trying to make small talk in another language was more than she wanted to take on. It was easier to stay in her home and learn to be a gourmet cook—which she did very well. But that didn’t help Mike with his work, which was what she had committed to him before they left the States. Mike’s life expanded in the new community as he met more and more people, while Valerie continued to live a very “small” life wrapped around her kitchen and children.

It was obvious to us that Valerie struggled with change and that she was afraid of making mistakes in public, using the wrong words in a new language or making some cultural misstep. It wasn’t about her being selfish or aloof—she

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