Have you ever been in this situation? You have a great new idea. You propose “the next big thing” to your team. Team member(s) look at you like you’re speaking Klingon. You know what’s next: “But, we’ve always done it this way.”

Ugh.

While it’s not much of an argument as far as I’m concerned, the “we’ve always done it this way” plea stands up as justification to maintain status quo in far too many circumstances and with far too many organizations.

This resistance has become commonplace or natural because, well, it is natural. We as humans tend to avoid change at all costs. We only feel compelled to change, as the old saying goes, “When the pain of remaining the same exceeds the pain of changing.”

It’s true, isn’t it? When you, perhaps, gained a couple of pounds that made you slower on the track or a little slower up the stairs, maybe you didn’t forego the potato chips or TV marathons. But – whoa – when you could barely zip up your favorite jeans, you hit the gym faster than you could say “Cheetos.”

We’re all guilty of it. We get comfortable in our skin. We remain wherever gravity keeps us, as opposed to trying to fly a little higher — unless we’re absolutely forced to push back by dire straits or urgent situations.

Back to our naysayer (“But we’ve always done it this way!”). Remember, and feel free to remind your resistant colleagues, there were a lot of things we all used to do. We used to drive with babies on our laps. We used to smoke … on a plane, at the office, while pregnant. Our ancestors used to wear corsets so tight they fractured rib bones, and eat pills containing tapeworms that would effectively eat stomach contents – all in the name of beauty. We have since made enough scientific or societal advances to realize the yesteryear practices that formerly wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow aren’t socially acceptable and | or are downright unsafe now.

While it’s unlikely (let’s hope) that your organization or team’s current, stagnant approach is as deadly serious as some of the practices listed above, it is likely that you’ll look back some day on that “old” approach and wonder why the heck anyone ever signed up for such an inefficient, ineffective way of doing things in the first place. In some respects, maybe your existing processes or practices will become like some of the outdated and quaint societal conventions above. But you’ll never know unless you act and resist the natural resistance you encounter from fellow team members too afraid, too lazy or too comfortable to do anything else than what they’ve always known.

Lean in to the resistance.

Be an agent for change.

Lead.