Transition. What does that word mean anyway? By itself it sounds almost calming and natural. The dictionary defines it as a passage from one position, stage, state or subject to another. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Like the flowers starting to bloom in the spring. Getting out your summer clothes and packing away your winter ones, in preparation for the warmer months. The transition of the seasons. A transition that is expected. One you can count on. One you prepare for.
Not exactly calming
I don’t know about you, but transitions for me have seemed neither calming nor natural. Nor have the big ones been planned or expected. Nope. In my dictionary, transition is defined as my life abruptly changing one day…and since it was unexpected I never happen to be wearing the right outfit. No gentle passage for me. Nope. It’s usually more like some wild plunge off a cliff with no clear destination in sight. No destination but a definite desire to avoid rock bottom. So I find myself asking again, is it possible to make it through this unexpected transition with grace and dignity? Is it possible for me to end up with something or somewhere better than the place, thing or situation I left?
Adventure’s in the journey
I know the final answer is yes. The journey to that yes is where the adventure lies. I know that because fourteen years ago, I made it through an unexpected divorce and ended up in a better place. More on that later. Now I am staring an unexpected job loss right in the face. Twenty years at one place and then in one day it’s done. Didn’t see that coming, either. Maybe I better get my eyes checked…..
Want to travel along?
In any event, I know it’s time for the transition journey again. Knowing is one thing. Doing is another. Frankly I’m worried and a little, OK, really scared. I need some help. I need companions to go on this journey with me. Who’s game? Companions on a journey always make the journey easier and definitely more fun. Who’s packed and ready to go with me? Let’s do this transition thing together. Mine is a new job. Yours could be a divorce or a move to a new city or something else. Exactly what it is doesn’t really matter. Instead, it’s how we move through it that makes all the difference. So let’s move together. Hop in!
About Kathy Mock
“I’m in transition.” Yes, what does that mean anyway? Aren’t we always in transition? Often I’ve I listened to friends tell stories of loss and change: the death of a parent, the loss of a job, a promotion to a new job, divorce, estranged family members, cancer. I’ve attended funerals of my clients, listened to what it feels like to no longer have breasts. When others describe their difficult passages, I listen with sadness — yet also can see it’s part of life, right? Painful — yet still natural. There’s nothing “wrong” with my friends just because they’re struggling.
So why then when I went through my divorce — I think: “What’s wrong with me? if I were more ‘together,’ this wouldn’t be happening to me.”
I’m smart, he’s smart — why can’t we figure this out? We’re not trying hard enough.
I feel like I should have more control. Like this shouldn’t be happening to me — or if I were somehow more capable, it wouldn’t be.
It’s taken me 5 years to say about my divorce — ‘sometimes things just fall apart and no matter how hard we try to change the outcome … things change, people change, yes…I changed.’ As I write these words, I can see the kind looks in so many of my friends’ eyes as they listened to me over and over, tearfully trying to accept what’s happened. Sounding like a broken record conversation after conversation. Yep. It’s about friends. The pain of change is inevitable. But we don’t have to go it alone.
I’m hopping in and along for the ride because just as I think a “transition” is over and life will be more settled, a new one comes along. What happened to the theory that life slows down as you get older and you gracefully slide into retirement? I’m finding that as I get older the road of life gets more bumpy and less predictable. “Curve ahead” seems to be the sign I see every time I think I’ve just come around a corner.
I’m stil transitioning after over a year at a new job and am now trying to understand how to help my aging parents figure out what might be a new transisition for them.
I’m in your car Kathy and along for the ride because no matter what transition it is, the ride is less bumpy and more fun when your friends are along!