Making Friends with Change

We all go through changes in life.

Change is the one thing we can be certain of, whether it’s change we choose, or whether it’s change that others choose for us.
It might be a change at work, moving house, expecting a child or leaving home.
And always we’re encouraged to focus our attention on the new thing that’s coming up.
The new area or house we are moving to, the new work or the new family life.

And yet I have experienced much resistance to change. How about you?
My secondary school, my college, my first job.
I felt at home in these places and wanted to stay. My life had become familiar, predictable and therefore I perceived it as safe, secure.
Starting something new carried some excitement but it was also unfamiliar and unpredictable.
I found that accepting the new was harder. It felt like I was dragging my feet.
What to do? Employ some of my favourite pastimes. Research, Reading, Finding out, Learning.

What did I discover?
There’s a difference between change and transition.

Change happens outside ourselves, e.g. new laws, new job, new people, e.g. team members, family members.
Change is outcome focused and future oriented with the emphasis on what’s new.

Transition is personal, internal and how we connect with and make sense of change.
Transition begins with endings, with letting go of past realities, roles, identities, places and people

This robust model, created by American professor William Bridges, helped me understand the process and what needs to happen to smooth the path of any change.
I learned that transition takes us through 3 stages

ENDINGS…. As one door closes….

As you can see, unlike change, which focuses on the new, transition asks us at first to pay most of our attention to the endings that change brings. New growth cannot take root on the old ground. Endings provide us with a clearing ground.
We can muddle up an ending of something with the end of everything. They are different yet inevitably endings bring up feelings associated with loss. This was what I experienced at the end of my school and college days, and have done many times since.
As T.S. Eliot reminds us,
‘What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning
The end is where we start from’

NEUTRAL ZONE/LIMBO…. Lost in the fog….

Then, in the second stage, we find ourselves in limbo. We’re no longer in the previous situation, but neither are we in the new one.
This maybe is the most uncomfortable stage, one we’re tempted to move through quickly or want to revert to that which is known and therefore familiar, even if didn’t serve us.
We humans generally like to have a plan, to know what’s coming up, to be moving forward in a clear direction. But in this stage, clear direction is rarely possible. We’re more like lost in the fog!

BEGINNINGS….Green shoots…

Finally, having gone through these two stages, we can more fully arrive at our new beginning.
Learning and applying this has led to a smoothing of the path of change across all of my life. As you’ll notice, there’s overlap between each stage so it’s not a smooth linear path.
So what to do at each of the stages?

AND NEXT…

This post has been an introduction to Bridges’ transition model. It’s one I have found most helpful and hope that you do too.
In the next 3 posts I’ll explore in greater depth each of the stages. along with suggestions that make it easier to navigate your way from endings to beginnings.