The Risk Of Change

The Risk of Change

Jesus looked at them intently and said, “Humanly speaking, it is impossible. But with God everything is possible.”

Matthew 19:26

The 1949 class of Harvard Business School graduates was stunningly successful. Fortune magazine dubbed them “The Class the Dollars Fell On.”^a But when these graduates were in their midfifties, a landmark study revealed that some ranked high on a scale of well-being and demonstrated passion for living while others came in at the bottom of the scale and showed little contentment, let alone passion.

Compared to any other group of Americans of their age, this entire class had done exceptionally well, but some were still soured on life. They suffered from boredom in their work and seemed to feel they could have excelled in their careers even more. Their ego wound in their business life spread discontentment to their marriages, their relationships with their children, and their health.

When researchers probed the data to understand the dynamics of the unhappy alumni, they came to realize much of their despondency was due to a single quality. In fact, it was the most salient quality separating them from their happier former classmates. That latter had a willingness to risk change while the unhappy group resisted it. Two-thirds of them, in fact, said they would love to change what they did—but they didn’t. The researchers’ conclusion: “Even among men for whom a superior education has opened many doors, well-being is not easily sustained without a continuing willingness to risk change.”^b

Don’t misunderstand. The risk-taker’s advantage is not about being impulsive or careless. It’s about boldness, not bravado; action, not arrogance; risk, not recklessness. A calculated risk invigorates our souls and expands our lives. “Man cannot discover new oceans,” said French author André Gide, “unless he has the courage to lose sight . . . of the shore.”

We all have a shore that gives us security. It represents the comfortable and easy part of our lives that we know well. What might happen if you, as a couple, had the courage to lose sight of the shoreline that keeps calling you back from discovering new oceans? And what might those oceans be for the two of you?

One doesn’t discover new lands without consenting to lose sight, for a very long time, of the shore.

—André Gide

^a 51

^b 52