Breathe, Then Go Again summary

Routines are comfortable. You know what to do and what to expect. Half the time, you’re on autopilot. And then things change. The map in your head no longer corresponds to the landscape. You’re suddenly in unfamiliar territory. 

Change is a disruptor even when it’s change we seek. The first weeks in a new workplace are never easy. You knew how to do your old job. You understood the routines, the people, the unwritten rules. Now you have to figure it all out from scratch: who makes the real decisions, which meetings actually matter, who’s going to help you – and who isn’t. 

A few months later, the uncertainty is gone. You know the terrain. You can navigate its paths and dodge its pitfalls. The work is the same as when you started, but you’ve adapted. We rarely stop to think about adaptation because it happens so gradually, but it’s one of the main ways we master uncertainty and grow, at work and in life. 

Because change is constant, we always have to adapt anew. Colleagues come and go and new managers bring new workflows. If you’ve just gotten comfortable with your company’s buggy software, there’s a good chance your boss is about to roll out a novel system with novel bugs. Comfortable, established patterns rarely last. We’re constantly forced to adjust expectations and find new ways forward in circumstances beyond our choosing. 

It’s a natural instinct to resist change. When the routines and relationships that help us understand the world shift, we feel less certain about our place in the world. Many philosophical traditions have explored this experience. Buddhism suggests that the cause of much of our suffering is holding on too tightly to things that must pass.  If we resist inevitable change, we’ll always be rowing against the tide. Stoicism arrives at a related insight: our energy is better spent adapting to reality than trying to resist events beyond our control.

Both philosophies encourage us to accept what we can’t control. The emphasis is on flexibility rather than passivity. Think of a tree in a storm. The branches that survive aren’t necessarily the thickest or strongest, but those that can bend with the wind. Faced with an overwhelming force beyond their control, they move with it rather than resisting it. Of course, there are limits. Sometimes, it’s wiser to seek shelter from the storm. But as we’ll see in a moment, learning to tell when to stay the course and when to change direction is one of the keys to greater resilience.