Pretty sure there's an "I" in irrational

So, it's official.  The Google Reader I've come to trust as a daily companion is going away. And the problem with trying something that "never caught on as a mainstream customer experience" is that I liked it.  A lot. And now I have to change. I'm a big proponent of change. But not this change.

Part of what makes change and innovation (which are, essentially, synonymous) so interesting is the emotional attachments we make to the way things are, unless we are the one wanting the change.  Allow me to become disenchanted with my RSS reader and choose another one?  Great.  Shut down the RSS reader I like and make me choose another one?  Not great at all.

The humor here is that the outcome is exactly the same.  I get to experiment with ways of aggregating the things I like to read...to play with technology...to try something new.  And I'm irrationally unhappy about it, mostly because the timing was not of my choosing.

The biggest obstacle to successful change is active resistance, sometimes for very good reasons.  When we can do something faster or better the way we do it now (as opposed to the better, faster new way), it's extremely difficult to make near-term choices we do not like or want for the promise of longer-term improvement.  Its' why most of us don't change bad habits we know we need to change.

Never let it be said that people who understand change and the importance of change to both learning and innovation are more rational than anyone else when on the receiving end of a change we do not want.

I'm going  to miss that reader.