Challenge Day #5

 Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes

William Bridges captures the process of transition – the psychological re-norming that occurs after change in his book, Transitions: Making Sense of Life’s Changes.  Although no two people transition in exactly the same way, understanding the basic process has served me and those I have worked with well. It has helped ground me during times of stress, by providing a framework to reflect on how I’m managing myself and anticipating what may come next.

I have always been fascinated by the process of moving individuals to a new state of being.  Bridges’ work helped me become clear that change happens in an instant.  It is what happens before and after the change that is often difficult for individuals to manage.  His work focuses on three phases, Endings, The Neutral Zone, and eventually New Beginnings. 

I believe that individuals accept/decide to change and when a significant number of individuals in an organization change the organization changes.  This means transition is always about individuals redefining themselves and their roles.  The transition process would be easy to manage if it happened in a neat orderly fashion but it doesn’t.  It is more like a good soup, a little bit of this and little bit of that and then perhaps a bit more of the this or that.  Good soup is best when you taste each of the individual ingredients and then with time and attention they blend together in unique and tasteful way, just as a successful transition involves all three phases and creates a glorious new you.

Each phase has its purpose.   Endings which involve the dis’es: Disengagement, Disidentification, Disenchantment, and Disorientation. Each of these is about letting go – letting go of what has been in order to make room for the new.  The Neutral Zone which is what I think of as the simmer stage – is a time when not much appears to happen, sort of a mental time out.  In historical accounts, it is often described as wandering, for example wandering in the desert. Being okay with doing nothing isn’t easy, especially for busy people.  However, the “doing nothing” can often be a catalyst for creativity. It is a time for gathering energy to move forward.  The third phase is New Beginnings. It is when what was no longer is and something new has been created.  Just like making a good soup, it is no longer the individual ingredients, it is now vegetable beef barley soup.  New Beginnings is about creation of the new.

  

What I’ve learned from Bridges is to pay attention and be at peace with each ingredient of the processes and being aware that in the end, I am growing a new me. 

*If you are experiencing a transition email me and I'll be glad to send you a reflective exercise.