It's not your fault. We are resistant to change. Oh not just any change, but yes, studies show the oldest part of our brain is always working to protect us and that means taking the tried and true. So it isn't because we are all closed minded and unwilling to learn; it is because we've learned through human evolution that doing the same thing the same way each time generally results in high productivity and makes us feel good. Doing something a different way gives us the opposite result, so we feel bad or we're worried about our jobs. Only a fool would drop a tried and true way of doing something to try something untested. Really? As you read this, did you shake your head in agreement or dismay?

Here's what I know. I can fall back on my cave dwelling years as a reason not to push through times when I'm being resistant to change or I can refuse to think with the reptilian part of my brain.

My daughter asked me what memories a person "picks" to recall when suffering from Alzheimer's or Dementia. No, she wasn't suggesting I have signs of the disease! Since I'm fortunate that I don't have anyone close to me with the disease, I shared with her my limited knowledge. I told her I know it's a disease that causes brain cell and tissue loss and over time the brain shrinks. The hippocampus, which is in charge of storing new memories doesn't work so well and the prefrontal cortex, which is very roughly in charge of retrieving those memories, is sometimes referred to as "working memory." I suggested to my daughter that she look at the brain like a computer; at its most simplistic as having RAM - Random (which I like to call Rapid) Access Memory like a computer and Secondary Memory, such as the hard drive. In the end I told her I had no idea how the brain "picks" the memories it does, but I do know that we/she is young and healthy enough to have influence on how our brains work. And that's why I'm not willing to fall back on any excuse for not facing change head on that takes me back 20,000+ years. I'd rather try to hang on to my adolescent years where my frontal lobe isn't as fully connected. Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting that any of us want to make the kinds of changes we did in our teen years, but we want to keep that frontal lobe as fresh as possible and listen less to the reptilian part.