"Life is one big transition."
I recently heard someone say that the transition from fall to winter is very challenging for them, but that once winter is here, they’re fine. I pondered these words and realized that this statement is true for many people with many different things in life. The transition is always hard – whether it’s going from summer to fall, fall to winter, high school to college, or anything else that may change the course of your day to day life.
Most people go into a state of shock, physically or emotionally, and have a hard time dealing with the changes during the transition time. One of the hardest transitions in life happens when you lose a loved one that played an important role in your life.
I experienced this most recently last month, in August. I lost my dear papa (my maternal grandfather). I was very close to my papa and this loss has hit me very hard. I find myself now is a space of transition as I grieve. This transition time is hard, as I cope with my papa’s earthly departure. There are moments where I feel fine and others where I break down into tears seemingly out of nowhere. The past several weeks have felt like walking through a thick fog. I don’t feel like myself. I don’t feel “all there.” Truthfully, I feel broken-hearted – like a piece of my heart is missing.
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What I’m realizing during this time is that you must take the time you need to heal in the midst of a transition. There is no deadline or timeline for healing. It is an ongoing process. It’s okay to feel vulnerable and fragile during a transition.
Life transitions can be divorce, children leaving home, beginning or going back to school, finding yourself unemployed, getting a promotion or just being stuck in a rut looking for your life’s purpose.
Whether you are just starting off and wondering what the world holds for you, whether to go to college and if so, what program or career would be meaningful to you, or you are about to retire and you’re redefining your life’s purpose – life transitions happen to all of us and they require us to give ourselves time and to feel (truly feel) all that we’re feeling, in the midst of the transition.
So, smile when you need to. Cry when you need to. Break and bend when you can’t do anything else. Have a meltdown and fall again and again. Then pick yourself up. And know that all of your struggles will lead you to experience something greater, and lead you to ultimately be the best version of yourself.
The same way you switch from light jackets to winter coats and slip-on shoes to boots, in the transition from fall to winter – the transitions are the hardest parts. Once we can soften into the transition and take the time to relax into them, the transition can soon evolve into a place of respite, a place that is filled with possibilities and excitement – a place that holds the space for us to become even stronger.
2 thoughts on “Transitions”
Dear Marina, I wish I had the right words to tell you how sorry I am for your loss the way you do for all of us. You always say the right things and make us feel like we are going to get through this… the only way is through this. Sending you love and light through this sad time, I’m sure your papa was an amazing man and he lives on in you. xoxo
Wow, thank you so much for your loving and kind words, Nivedita! It means so much to me. The only way out is through, always. And I am so grateful to have loving people like you in my life who help me with the “through” part. I am blessed for that. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. xoxo