Systems’ Comfort: Resistance to Change

Most people love comfort: food, activities, people. What makes things “comfortable” is how familiar the thing is. The comfort food we all crave is usually foods from our youth; the activities that are comfortable we’ve done a hundred times. the reason I used comfortable in quotes above is because in systems whether family, work or church, the way things are and have always been may be very unpleasant, yet “comfortable” in the sense that they are a known quantity. Most people fear the unknown. That’s why most people, even abuse victims are willing to stay: the alternative to a bad situation may be an even worse one.

That’s why patterns stay the same in families and organizations. The more isolated a family, a community, or an organization is, the more it stay the same. The isolation may take the form of physical distance, how closed the system is (how many people enter or leave) or even personality (a system where people are open minded is more likely, but necessarily, more open to change). Many people in systems have learned that changing the status quo means a backlash from the group, so they have given up trying to change.

Doing the same way can be helpful if the environment around the system is stable. But a system that refuses to change when the environment has changed will eventually die. Imagine a man standing outside in a bathing suit for 6 months. It might feel good in July, but not in January! Many civic organizations are so established, even set in their ways, that to change would literally rip the organizations apart. Thus to change even when necessary can cause more harm than good to an organization and even to the people in it, or so they fear. Actually, some organization will rip people apart who bring change, but the demise of  a system may or may not destroy its members.