How to Bounce Forward, 2nd Edition

Introduction: The Bounce Cycle

The ancient Greeks had two words for time: chronos and kairos. Chronos, the source of the word ‘chronological’, refers to ordered or sequential time. Kairos refers to an indeterminate moment within time when something special happens. It’s an interesting and fine distinction. For most of us, day-to-day life is just the passage of time, but then there are moments, days, weeks, months or even years that stand out as especially significant. This sort of time changes lives.

Change of any sort can be uncomfortable, confronting and painful. For the most part we automatically assume that change is difficult and should be avoided wherever possible. And yet who said that change was bad? Change is like the weather: it’s inevitable and in itself is neither good nor bad— it just is. Rain is good for the farmer who needs it to grow his crop. If, however, you’ve saved all year to take your family to Disney World and it rains every day, then the same condition is far from welcome. Interestingly, kairos also means weather in both ancient and modern Greek.

Change for me came when I was fitted with the most advanced bionic arm in the world. Learning how to control the bionics in my arm has been a difficult change, yet looking back I realise that my bionic arm can do more and is stronger than my real arm ever was.

Our attitude to change essentially comes down to who initiates the change or how it is initiated. If we initiate the change, then it can be seen as positive ...