I’ve been engaging major transitions for over three years now.
Just this calendar year, I got a new boss, said goodbye to roommates and moved into the city, adopted a cat, started blogging, and changed jobs. Before that there were huge transitions at work, and even more in my personal life as I wrestled with my faith, changed communities, started online dating, and dealt with the reactions of friends and family to all those decisions.
A lot of those changes I chose, but many of them were thrust upon me. With both combined, it’s been quite the season of transition.
I’m grateful for the support I found and that found me in the middle of it all. As hard as it’s been – and it’s been hard – it’s called things out of me I didn’t know I had.
It’s not that I’m that different. I recognize every part of me that’s been called upon.
But I’m different. I’m actually comfortable in my skin for maybe the first time. I know the boundaries of me – where empathy and differentiation meet, where my stuff ends and someone else’s stuff begins.
Not that I think I’ve got any of that nailed down. I’m still learning and growing, still surprising myself. But I’m the best me I’ve ever been, and I’m still learning and growing, still surprising myself!
I’ve just finished three months of a new job full of major events, and as I look ahead, with all I still have to learn at work, I realized this weekend there are no new transitions in view.
I’m not sure what life looks like if I’m not managing transitions.
(That in itself feels like a major transition.)
But not a bad one. I have a lot to learn yet about stillness, but this doesn’t feel like stuckness, and that’s good.
Turning forty triggered a lot for me. It got me moving in ways I didn’t even understand and had no idea where would take me. I don’t shrink from calling it a “mid-life crisis,” but I knew from the outset I wanted it to be productive and constructive. A positive mid-life crisis, if you will, even though I’ve done a whole lot of grieving along the way.
It has been positive, thanks mostly to two components: a good therapist and the Serenity Prayer.
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.
I expect it’s those same things that will help me continue to learn and grow in this new season of relative stillness. Seeking wise help, and discerning what I can do and what I can’t. What I can do, and what to let go of doing.
And preparing for the transitions that will come again, sooner or later.
There’s still plenty to do.
Leaning Out 