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Embracing Transitions

By Vicki Farina

Stuck. Frozen. Paralyzed.

I am like the lady on the flying trapeze who sees the new trapeze bar rapidly approaching, but I do not want to take my hand off the old one so that I can fully embrace the rhythm of the swing of the new bar as it is coming at me so fast.

I hold on for my life. And I don't dare to look down.

A change in ministry opportunity, a move to a new location, different house, new baby, new relationships, empty next, retirement, an old identity — no one wants to admit to being frozen with fear and anxiety when faced with the possibility of change.

William Bridges, a preeminent authority on managing change, wisely notes, "It isn't the changes that does you in, it's the transitions." Oh, the journey of getting from where you are to where you need or want to be — that time in between can be one of the greatest challenges in life. Change is situational. Transitions are psychological. 1

So how do we navigate these psychological waters? How do we move from the familiar and comfortable to the unknown, uncharted, and often unsolicited events that change brings about?

Release the Old

"He told them this parable: 'No one tears a patch from a new garment and sews it on an old one. If he does, he will have torn the new garment and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined'" (Luke 5:36,37, NIV).

Every chapter must end before a new one can begin. The ending and beginning of the chapters in our life's story often involve grieving. Give yourself time to grieve. But determine not to stay there. Remind yourself, "Today, I feel sad or lonely or depressed, but I am not staying here. I will not feel this way tomorrow because tomorrow is a new day. I own this emotion. I am not denying I feel a certain way, but I refuse to get stuck."

Embrace the In-Between Time

"But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart" (Luke 2:19).

The in-between time is when the old is gone, but the new isn't fully operational. It is when critical psychological realignment and repatterning take place. It is a cocoon season, when the caterpillar knows it is time to spin the cocoon, to move into what seems like hibernation. It is a neutral time. It is time in isolation. But it is also a time when God is busy creating and accomplishing a whole new metaphysical change. There, in the dark place, God transforms the old. Slowly and quietly, He begins to give new meaning and purpose.

Welcome the New

"If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" (2 Corinthians 5:17).

"He who was seated on the throne said, 'I am making everything new!'" (Revelation 21:5).

When the butterfly springs forth from the cocoon, it is never the same. In fact, when it went into the cocoon as a caterpillar, it certainly never imagined it would ever have graceful wings or the ability to fly. But God knew. This is a time of new beginnings, new identity, new energy, new purpose. Welcome this time of new, for it not in her goals, but in her transitions that woman is great. 2

Free. Spirited. Expectant.

ENDNOTES

• William Bridges, Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change (Cambridge, MA: DaCapo Press, 2003), 3.
• Ralph Waldo Emerson

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