We’ve all heard that a frog will jump out if placed in a pot of hot water, but will stay if placed in cool water that is slowly heated. The idea is that frogs cannot recognize the danger if it comes about gradually.

I don’t know if it’s true. How does one get a frog to stay anywhere? It is, however, an engaging idea, and if it doesn’t apply to frogs, it does apply to us. We adjust to huge changes, good or bad, much more comfortably when their pace is slow. We are capable of extreme adaptation if events unfold slowly enough.

For instance, would anyone in their right mind sign up to raise children if they had any real sense of the enormity of the job. Let’s see, for eighteen or more years you agree to put yourself aside some to nurture a little person or persons 24 hours a day, 365 days a week. You never get time off, and you foot the bill for all of it. Fortunately, we get to live it day by day, each phase getting us ready to deal with the next.

It’s also true of dealing with long term illness. Sometimes the death of a loved one begins with a fairly mild injury or illness and ends after a series of health challenges over maybe several years. You go from the idea of death not even being in the picture, to fear of its possibility, to seeing it as a welcome blessing. It doesn’t happen overnight. Your being stretches and stretches until it can accommodate the previously unthinkable.

In many cases, this ability to handle change is a gift; one that mankind might not be around without. But we also have the ability to adjust to extreme coercion and injustice, a sort of sick flip-side of a long journey that begins with just one step. This quirk of ours can make us vulnerable to the manipulation of others.

Molested children are often groomed for some time before the real abuse begins. Have you seen pedophiles discussing their approaches on TV? They single out children in need of attention and then tell them how smart they are, or how pretty, that they’re special. They might touch their arm first, and then move farther, always pushing the line, but not crossing it until they’re confident they can. Before they know it, a trusted adult becomes a monster.

Most women would run if they were abused in the beginning of a relationship. Often the men who eventually abuse them begin as very romantic, attentive boyfriends. Early on, his control can be misconstrued as the degree to which he cares. Criticism leads to verbal abuse, and shoving turns to hitting. Each incident is soothed with the tearful promise of I’ll never do it again, followed up with a honeymoon of good behavior. Some women fail to see just when their relationship became dangerous.

Kids don’t become criminals overnight. Young boys and girls don’t dream of being prostitutes when they grow up. Tyrants don’t generally grab power out of nowhere. They get where they are because of many small incidents, carried out consciously or not so consciously.

It’s possible for us to do, to become, or to endure the previously unthinkable because rather than hold some kind of square-one reference, we tend to measure experience from incident to incident. As long as the change from the last incident is not too extreme, and as long as the pace is fairly slow, we are able to absorb it. Succumbing to a certain amount of oblivion can be a blessing when we find we must accomplish huge tasks, or are experiencing times of great grief or upheaval. We must be on guard, however, against being lulled into absorbing unwanted changes. Sometimes when things just don’t feel right, it might be that they’re not.