Adaptation to an Ever Changing Environment

We all have developed skills in life which help us adapt and cope, in order to fit with our environment. We have a knowledge base which we have developed over the years, we depend on this knowledge base to understand the world, and we live in. Children are the prime examples of what human nature is really all about. Thinking processes have been developed over time starting as a young child. For example, a young child who is familiar with a dog has to take in and understand the difference between a dog and a horse. The child’s first response might be a horse is a big dog. The child must go through a process of adapting to a new concept of the horse and blend and coordinate old physical and mental structures into a new concept which is the concept of a horse. The child eventually understands the difference between a dog and a horse. This change in the thinking process, devises and modifies old patterns and thought processes into new ones.

Thinking process must and should change as we mature and grow in life. We can become too accustomed to interacting in the world in one set way. For example, thinking that everyone is honest and that we should be able to trust everyone serves a purpose when we are children. However, as we grow older we must realize that not everyone is honest. In reality we can be dealing with some very dishonest people in our lives. Perhaps not being able to adapt could be the root cause of my current level of frustration and anxiety at this time. We do not understand the world and we then feel alienated by the world. However, conflict or anxiety would be resolved when a person starts being able to distinguish between honest and dishonest people. The next step would be to recognize that a concept that served us at another time in my life is no longer working.

The point to all this is, that learning and growing in life is our human nature. As adults we tend to forget that we are supposed to always be growing and evolving, thus, forging a new identity as we grow older. Perhaps the stress that I’m currently experiencing is actually my inability to incorporate new information into an old way of coping and dealing with a new reality







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