Behavioral Sciences

Why do we hate new beginnings so much?

A psychologist explains

The beginning of something new (even if it's really good) embodies uncertainty and requires adaptation to the future that has the unknown - and all of these push us beyond what is mistakenly called the "comfort zone", and can cause real anxiety

Or Yanir

09/23/2022

Friday, September 23, 2022, 07:07

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Change is something people don't always like.

An illustration of a woman entering a room (Photo: ShutterStock)

New Year.

The first associations that probably come to your mind are apple, honey and maybe too much time with the family (but we'll talk about that another time).

Somewhere in this list of associations is also the pair of words "new beginning", and it is likely that your mind rushes to pass them on without delay.

If so, you're in good company and you're not the only ones who don't want to think about it.

But why do new beginnings make us feel bad?

Actually, it's pretty simple.

A new beginning means change, and change is something people don't always like, even if it's a positive change.

Humans are routine creatures, who in general like certainty and security and don't like to be surprised.

This is the basis of the importance of the weather forecast - we want to know when it will rain so that we can take an umbrella and not be surprised and get wet.

Many times "change" is something a bit shapeless and unclear, sometimes we don't even manage to think of a certain situation (or more precisely a transition between situations) as a change,

We are very uncomfortable outside the comfort zone

To understand why we don't like it, we first need to understand what exactly we are talking about when we talk about change.

Change is a transition from state A to state B.

Have you moved?

change

Have you started a new job?

change

Have you become parents?

change

Has your child started first grade?

change

Have you started eating organic buckwheat fiber instead of 300 grams of entrecote for dinner?

change

Have you started dating someone (or someone, this is a judgment-free space) new?

change

At first glance, all these situations may not seem related to each other, but they share a very basic common denominator - they are all the beginnings of something new and they all include in a structured way a transition from one situation to another, they embody uncertainty in the content and require adaptation to the future that has the unknown in it.

Along with the excitement that sometimes accompanies new beginnings, all of these push us beyond what is mistakenly called the "comfort zone", and can cause real fear and anxiety.

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To the full article

Let's try using an example.

You go to work on your familiar and usual road, but just today it is blocked and instead of a street there is a pothole that they say will one day have a train in it.

What is happening at this moment is that the information you had about your way to work is no longer correct, and you must adapt to a new situation and find a replacement for it.

It will probably take you exactly 15 seconds, but at the same time you may have quite a few questions - what is the new way?

Where exactly does it lead?

Is it blocked too?

How long will it take me to get this way?

Will I be able to arrive on time rather than late for the unnecessary meeting that the boss scheduled too early in the morning?

And what if a lot of rats escaped from the excavations and I have to share the road with them?

This is an easy example, with questions that are relatively easy to deal with and their consequences are probably not very substantial.

But now try to imagine it when something much more important happens, with consequences that can be much more significant for you.

What we don't know scares us.

Illustration of a caring person (Photo: ShutterStock)

The point is that when we are faced with change, we have much less information about the new situation than about the old situation, resulting in a greater sense of uncertainty.

The rules of the game change and we don't necessarily know all the new rules or feel insufficiently knowledgeable about them.

That's why the "comfort zone" is a bit of a misleading name - it's not always comfortable, but it's always more familiar, and what we don't know scares us.

So one of the basic reasons that new beginnings can be scary is that they involve not knowing.

We can commit to the process, but cannot be sure of the results.

It is hard for us to give up the old, even if it is not good

But change is not only dealing with something unfamiliar and the unknown, it is also giving up something old, and therefore - in the perception of most people - something good.

Studies know how to tell us today that most people have a tangible and reliable preference for things that have been around longer, and prefer the status quo to change.

Part of the reason for this is a perception according to which "if you've been doing it for so long, it's probably good."

If you are told that a certain treatment method for an ingrown toenail has been around for 1,000 years, you will probably prefer it to a method that has only been around for 10 years.

It's important to note that this thinking is not unreasonable in some cases - if something has stood the test of time and hasn't disappeared, it probably has at least some advantages over other things.

The problem with this thought is that tradition and longevity (which are actually the opposite of a new beginning) are really not always good predictors, but hide forces such as persistence, habit, marketing, fashion and more.

Moreover, there are areas where these factors should have no influence at all such as food and art.

Still, in various studies he found that people will appreciate beauty and taste more when it comes to old things than new things.

In one study they gave chocolate tasters and asked them to rate its taste, once they were told that it was first produced and sold 73 years ago, and once they were told that it was produced only 3 years ago.

Guess which one got a higher rating even though it's exactly the same chocolate.

New beginnings then, are actually changes.

Many times we have a hard time with them thanks to two main factors that lead us to prefer to avoid it - the fear of the unknown and the tendency to prefer something old, and this may happen to us even when it is a proactive and positive new beginning.

If we become aware of these two forces, it will be easier for us to break down our difficulty and deal with the beginning and the change in a better way.

Have a good year and full of easy beginnings.

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Tags

• New Beginnings

• A New Beginning

• New Year

• anxiety