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I asked a good friend how she deals with change. She replied that it depended on what realm we were talking about. It was a good reminder that we all constantly traverse different realms: the personal, the interpersonal, the physical, intellectual, spiritual. . . . Once you start realizing the many aspects of our lives and the areas that we dwell in, the concept of realms makes great sense.

This question about change applies to all of us. How do we manage change, both those we institute ourselves and those imposed from the outside? 

Lately, I am in the process of changing an old habit. To be clear, changing a habit is different from getting rid of a habit. Accepted wisdom posits that if you are planning to get rid of a particular habit, you need to have another ready one to put in its place. 

The habit I’m changing is ensuring that there are enough hangers in my closet for all my clothes. For reasons I don’t understand, I regularly run out of hangers. Then I have to rifle through the clothes to find empty ones. The new behavior (that I’m trying to make into a habit) is to put all the empty hangers into one central area of my closet. Even though I now do it most of the time, I’m struck by how I still sometimes forget. I don’t get hung up about it, but I’m observing the process with both curiosity and amusement.