Navigating Transition: Some Practical Tools

Why does it always seem to be that just when we think we have life figured out, the Universe decides it’s time to spice things up by throwing us a total curve ball?

Why does it seem like no matter how much we plan, strategize and do our work to figure out our path forward, that even when we choose to make changes to our own lives that there are always surprises that come up along the way that we didn’t expect?

Why can it feel so deeply unsettling and unsafe to go through periods of transition and change - even when we have all the self improvement and spiritual tools under our belt?

Why does it seem like no matter how much we try to tell ourselves we’re ok with change - when change finally comes we find ourselves longing for a more stable reality or to go back to what we had before - even if what we had before was arguably terrible?

How do we support ourselves through seasons of transition and the unknown, without slipping into spiritual bypassing or rushing the process so much that we settle ourselves back into something that’s comfortable and familiar but not actually ‘right’ for us?

That’s what we’re going to talk about today.

Transition - Why Does It Suck So Bad?

The first thing we have to realize and recognize about ourselves as human beings is that we have evolved to seek safety in sameness.

In other words, for as long as humans have been 'humaning', the reality has been that the most threatening element of reality was the element of the unknown.

When we were able to accurately and adequately predict what our environment was going to be like, we were able to form a way of life, a routine, that would allow us to get our needs met in the best ways we could, and in this we were able to find relative safety in what we were experiencing.

The things that tended to threaten our lives were those things that came out of ‘nowhere’, that altered our routines in a way that we couldn’t figure out fast enough to remedy or that presented us with a challenge we had no context for facing.

Drought, animal attacks, human attacks, a change of season, migration - all of these occurrences came in and caused a threat to our survival because they shifted something about how we were able to keep ourselves safe, happy and nourished.

Thus, we have evolved to have nervous systems that naturally want to cling to that which is familiar, that which is predictable and that which is repetitive.

Even when what’s familiar isn’t totally beneficial. Even when what’s familiar is painful or hard. Even when what’s familiar is holding us back from a more expanded and exciting experience.

As confusing as this may feel for us when we experience it, even when we are shifting from something that is objectively worse to something objectively better, there will be parts of us that resist, that have fear, that want to go back to how things were - and we will talk more about that later on in this post.

But the main thing to remember here is this - we are creatures that crave routine and habit for a reason.

Next, we have to understand that the more threatened we feel, the more we sense that our needs aren’t going to get met or that we’re going to be separated from that which we are relying upon for our needs to get met - the more we are going to cling to routine and the more we’re going to double down on habits and behaviors.

Again, part of how our nervous systems work is that whenever we perceive a threat, our bodies can’t actually tell the difference between an attack on our emotional safety, an attack on our mental safety, an attack on our spiritual safety or an attack on our physical safety.

Our bodies read all threats the same way - when I feel a sense of threat, my life is in danger.

This triggers the system into a state of fight, flight or freeze.

Meaning when we sense a threat to our survival, our bodies are going to jump into a state of survival - moving us into immediate action, into immediate lack or action or immediate attempts to escape whatever is happening to us.

This gets complicated because for us as modern humans, that fight, flight freeze reaction isn’t actually going to help us deal with our modern day threats.

For MOST of our time here on the planet as humans, attack meant a physical threat to our survival - an animal coming and trying to eat us, another human coming and attempting to take our crops, a storm - and to respond to these kinds of threats with fighting, fleeing or freezing was deeply productive and advantageous. This is how we survived so long - by being able to respond to threats in a ‘second nature’ kind of way.

From here, when the body perceived a threat, acted, and then survived - the body would then ‘program in’ that response as a natural impulse that would then be activated the next time we sensed a similar threat.

Meaning rather than having to think about running away from the lion or strategizing how we were going to fight off another human - the body would sense that feeling of not being safe and would immediately spring into the same action that it perceived saved our lives the last time we felt that threat.

Again this was super advantageous for us in times when we were living close to nature and quick responses were quite literally the difference between survival and death for us.

Unfortunately for us now as modern humans, we live in very different circumstances now - but we still have the same programming from previous times in our history.

What many of us don’t recognize is that for us as modern humans, the first ‘threat’ most of us ever experienced was the feeling that our caregivers were pulling away from us, rejecting us, scolding us or otherwise harming us.

This was the biggest and most existential threat to our survival as our bodies were growing and our minds were forming - because we were fully dependent upon our caregivers for providing all of our needs for us, for understanding us, for keeping us safe and protected.

The number one threat to our survival as we perceive it as children was to be rejected, abandoned or abused by the people that we needed for literally everything.

When we experienced this growing up - especially if we experienced it repetitively - our bodies and brains were then going to go about looking for the ‘patterns’ that were causing our caregivers to do what they were doing. Our bodies and brains were going to start to look for the things that we were doing, saying, being, not being and so on that seemed to be ‘causing’ our caregivers to behave how they were - and we were then going to start to augment our behavior in order to escape the threat.

This is where we learned to reject parts of ourselves, to enhance characteristics that are not true to us, to hide our expressions, to blame, shame and guilt ourselves, to find fault with our bodies, to numb out and escape the pain through various methods of emotional suppression, where we learned to be people-pleasers, where we developed a sense of ‘hypervigilance’ around the behaviors and movements of those around us.

This is where we would have started to develop patterns of feeling rejected/unsafe and ‘acting’ on those feelings with behavior modification techniques that we then perceived to be the REASON we survived the threat.

These responses would then become our natural impulses every time we felt rejected, unsafe or like we weren’t going to get our needs met - as our bodies were just behaving exactly how they evolved to behave.

Sense a threat - find the pattern - do an action - survive the threat - lather, rinse repeat.

For many of us, the fact that we seem to be in patterns of ‘self sabotage’ can feel really perplexing - but the reality is your body is repeating programs it believes saved you from rejection - the biggest threat to our survival as humans in the modern world!

So what does all of this have to do with transition? Let’s get back to our main point here.

Transition = Unfamiliarity

When we look at the concept of transition, what we’re really looking at is CHANGE.

We’re looking at facing a reality where our normal, muscle memory responses to life are no longer going to be as relevant or relevant at all to our current circumstances. We’re facing a reality where what we could once rely upon to be a consistent source of nourishment may no longer be there. We’re facing a situation where what was once a given is no longer so.

We’re looking at being in a reality where what was giving us a sense of control, security and autonomy before has changed - throwing us into a state of dysregulation and stress.

This is why even when the changes we are making in our lives are self imposed and when they are creating circumstances that are objectively better than the circumstances we existed in previously - there will be parts of us that still feel scared, insecure and like they want to ‘go back’ to what was.

Because what was, was predictable. We knew how to operate in what was. We knew how to get our needs met in what was. We knew how to navigate what was in a way that allowed us to be in a state of relative consistency - even if what was, was chaotic and messy - it was still OUR NORMAL.

And our bodies are going to seek for our normal. Because our bodies evolved to see our normal as safety.

This is why when a transition that we DIDN’T expect happens, we are going to be thrown into a state of deep feelings of loss, fear and unhappiness.

Even when we ignore the individual factors of whatever it is we are transitioning out of and into - the very nature of transition itself is unsettling and uncomfortable.

The lack of familiarity is going to feel like a threat and this is something we must have deep awareness of and compassion for ourselves around if we want to move through transition in a way that serves us.

Then we can start to address the live reality of the specific transition that’s taking place in our lives, and we can start to find steps and actions that will support us as we move into our new lives.

What To Expect As We Move Through Transition

When we find ourselves in a situation where life has pulled the rug out from under us, or when we’ve taken proactive steps to shift our own experience in some way, there are going to be some very predictable phases we are likely going to move through.

The more we can have awareness of these phases, the more we can give ourselves compassion, and the more we can find some sense of ‘predictability’ even amongst the ‘chaos’ of change.

Understanding what to expect when we face what was unexpected can be very calming for us.

Fear: So first things first - know that in the beginning, there is likely going to be a deep, body based, nervous system response to change.

When life changes - we get broken up with, we lose a job, we lose a loved one, our health fails, we get injured, we get a new job, we move locations - we must first expect the reality that our bodies are going to freak out and we are going to feel fear.

We are going to resist, we are going to try to ‘go back’ and our system is going to be hyper alert for anything that is new and different and it’s going to be reacting in a way that may feel uncharacteristic or surprising to us.

We may find that the pull to engage in activities that numb us out, distract us, pull us into a different state or help us to not feel what we’re feeling becomes extra strong.

We may find that things we haven’t struggled with in terms of self sabotage, coping mechanisms and negative thought patterns about ourselves resurface in a way that feels out of control.

We may find ourselves desperately clinging to what we used to have - fighting to try to maintain what was once our reality to the best of our ability - even when this means blatantly ignoring parts of our new lives that are clearly indicating that change has happened and the old way no longer works.

It’s likely here that the mind is going to be coming up with the most frightening stories it can about what may happen to you as you continue down the path you’re on. Stories of how you won’t be able to figure it out, won’t be able to cope, won’t be able to get your needs met - stories of all the worst case scenarios are going to be at the forefront of your mind and they are likely going to feel life forgone conclusions.

This is normal.

This is going to happen.

Expect the fear to eb and flow. Expect that you are going to need lots of time and space to process the fear - to cry, to talk it out, to journal, to speak with someone you can trust who is able to support you.

Through this, I want to remind you that the reality of what you are going to face is likely not going to be as bad as your brain wants to tell you it’s going to be right now.

You will learn.

You will adapt.

You will find a new normal.

The turmoil of the first few days, weeks or months of a transition will not last in terms of it’s intensity.

Most importantly, I highly suggest that you never believe anything you think about your life past about 9 pm at night, or anything you think about your life when you’re particularly hungry or undernourished in some way.

The fear is going to be there.

If you can learn to watch it, to make space for it, to feel it without RESPONDING to it right away, if you can learn to let it rise and fall - you are going to see that it does pass.

See if you can allow yourself to take lots of breaks in your day to allow yourself to shake, scream, cry and move that fear out of your body. See if you can allow yourself to question if those scary stories your mind is telling you are actually happening RIGHT NOW - and if they aren’t, see if you can gently draw yourself back to just what you’re doing here in this moment.

Can you bring yourself to just what’s happening here, and can you allow yourself to do just the next step ahead of you - without racing ahead to try to figure out the next several steps?

THIS is going to be the way to move through the fear.

Orient to your reality. Do just what’s ahead of you.
Allow the fear to be moved through your body with movement and expression.
Challenge the scary thoughts by being just where you are.
Witness the feelings of fear and see if you can pause on acting on them until the sensation is less intense.

This will help you walk through.

Lack Of Will: The next thing I want to ‘flag’ in terms of what to expect when we go through a transition period in our lives is the reality that we are going to have some days where we simply ‘don’t want to/feel so overwhelmed by everything that pretty much ANY life task feels like too much.’

This is totally, totally normal.

There will be days where emotions are super high and intense, where we have bursts of inspiration/expression/moments of clarity. There will be days where we are in ‘fight’ mode and feel fired up and like we are going to change this situation no matter what it takes. There will be days where we feel a little more able to accept what is and make plans around our new normal.

Then, there will be days where none of the above is true. Where we feel flat. Dead. Numb. Where life feels like a blur and where trying to figure out what to do next feels like climbing Mount Everest.

If this happens, the first step is to know that again, this is normal.

Some days our bodies and nervous systems are simply not going to be able to handle the intensity. Some days our emotions are going to be fried. Some days our sense of orientation is going to be so deeply rocked that we aren’t going to be able to ‘get ourselves together’ like we normally would.

Because change is scary, hard and a lot, and it taxes the body/mind in a really big way - again especially if the transition was something we didn’t choose or something that came on unexpectedly.

When we feel that dead/numb feeling, the first thing we want to do is not freak out - because it can feel really scary to feel like you’ve lost yourself or your will to do what you need to do. It can be really unsettling to go from the ‘high’ of strong emotions/fighting/bargaining/trying to figure out steps to the ‘low’ of overwhelm and burnout.

Just know that this too shall pass. You’re not going to feel dead/numb forever. You’re not going to get stuck here. Life is going to go on and you’re going to feel differently again.

**Quick note - if you enter this numb/lack of motivation feeling and it lasts more than a week or two, I would highly recommend seeking support from a licensed practitioner of some sort. If we fall into true depression that is sustained, that’s not something we want to play around with. Especially if you notice that you aren’t able to care for yourself or those that rely upon you. If this phase doesn’t have its peaks and troughs but rather is sustained, that is when we need to seek help. Take care of yourself because you are worthy of that.**

On those down days, remind yourself that all you have to do is TODAY.

Give yourself space not to think about the future, not to try to plan or strategize, give yourself permission to be in a ‘low’ space - and then reorient your focus to doing only that which NEEDS to be done.
Allow yourself to slow down where you can.
Give yourself permission to do just the bare minimum that you need to do for yourself to keep yourself reasonably functioning and cared for.
Give yourself permission not to be perfect, not to follow your routine, not to achieve everything you’re used to achieving in the day.
Focus on feeding yourself, resting where you can, working where you need to work and only socializing in ways that actually feel nourishing and comforting for you.
Ask for help on these days. Allow yourself to receive the support of those around you.
Take care of those who are under your care - and make sure you don’t ask any more of yourself than that.
Communicate with those around you that you are in a ‘low’ and that you may not be yourself today.
Take the expectation off of yourself that you’re going to be living ‘normally’ and again just let yourself pair down your life to only what’s truly essential and don’t ask more of yourself on these days.
Give yourself permission to sit and stare out the window or mindlessly scroll on your phone when you know you’ve done the essentials. Let yourself veg out. Let yourself find comfort in routine and simple things.

Know that you will have energy again. You will have clarity again. You will have the will to figure things out again.

Just not today, and that’s ok.

Resistance And Fighting: Finally, we must expect that there are going to be parts of self that are going to resist the change, and that are going to fight to keep things how they were. Even when the change is something we’ve agreed to or initiated of our own volition - it’s normal to go through phases where we push back against the transition and try to make things ‘go back’ to how they were before.

We can understand why now - the brain and body want safety, and change is a threat to that safety - especially if the transition is something we did NOT choose or something that has caught us off guard in any way.

Even if we saw the change coming, even if we prepared for it, it’s likely that once it actually starts to happen, there will be parts of us that want to fight for normalcy and consistency even where and when that can’t exist.

When we are experiencing this, again the first thing we want to do for ourselves is have as much compassion as possible. We want to slow down as much as we can, connect with ourselves, and see if we can witness what’s coming up for us.

Being able to pause and watch what’s happening as we fight to hold onto what was, and as we resist changes that may be inevitable is a massive skill - so be gentle on yourself. There are going to be days and times when this won’t feel possible - where the urge to try to negotiate or do whatever you can to just STOP the wheels that are turning from turning is simply not something you can fight against - and that’s ok.

In the moments where you CAN slow down and witness this urge, the biggest key is to be kind to yourself. Validate that you don’t want things to change. Validate that this change isn’t what you wanted or is scaring you. Validate that you are longing for the comfort of what was. Validate that you are longing for all the hopes and dreams you had had for the path you were on before that you now have to let go of/rearrange. Validate that you are not sure what the outcome is going to be and that that’s uncomfortable.

Validate yourself.

Next, see if you can find some ways to access comfort, familiarity and consistency WITHIN the changes that are occurring around you.

See if you can look for some activities, routines, ways of being or comforting people to engage with that remind you that not EVERYTHING in your life has been changed, and that help you re-establish a sense of ‘normalcy’ as much as you’re able. Give yourself some room to find a bit of regulation in whatever routines are currently still viable for you. Notice what’s still the same, what you can still do that’s familiar and what feels safe for you within the chaos.

Finding safety within the transition instead of feeling like your only option is to fight the transition is a big key here.

Finally, give yourself some space to begin creating new routines within your new normal.

Of course, at first when transition hits there will be a period of time where it’s going to feel like everything has been shaken up, like there’s nothing to cling to and like your whole world is falling apart. That’s normal. Again those fear stories are likely going to come up and make you perceive that NOTHING is safe anymore. So long as you are able to practice being kind to yourself and reaching out for support where you need it - you will get through this phase.

Then as you do, you will start to see where you still have some of the old routines that you had before, and you will start to be able to find your power in the new situation.

Start asking yourself what this NEW you needs in order to feel safe, nourished and supported within this new environment. Start to pay attention to the ways you can connect with what’s GOOD about what’s changed. See if you can allow yourself to expand out of looking at only what was lost, into looing for what has been gained.

What new space do you have?
What are you now able to let go of that was not so positive in your life before?
What areas of yourself do you want to grow into in this new phase, now that you have a ‘fresh start’ in some aspect?
What could be nourishing about this new phase?
Is this a time where you can learn to receive comfort and support from others in a way you never have before?
Is this a time where you can allow yourself to let go of some things in your life that you once thought were super important that now you can see in a new light?
Where can you look at how this new situation is helping you shed what wasn’t working before?
Can you look at what wasn’t working before and start to assess WHAT wasn’t working about it, why it didn’t work and how you now have an opportunity to change your life in a way that will work better?
What are you learning about yourself, what you want, what you don’t want, what you need and don’t need as you move through this new phase?
What feelings have you been having that you weren’t able to look at or acknowledge before that you now have the ability to?
Can you start to use this transition as a way of empowering yourself to make changes in your life that will be SUPPORTIVE for you?

Now, if this feels like too much, that’s totally ok. Sometimes we’re not going to be ready to look for the positives, to look for our power or to look for where we can use this transition as an opportunity to create a life that will work better for us. That’s ok. If you need to give yourself space to just be upset, to validate yourself, to grieve and wish things could be how they were - that’s ok. If you need to exist in the space of just finding the comfort and routines that you can without trying to make new routines or without really ‘looking’ at what this transition is going to mean about your life right now - honor that.

You will get there.

One day you will get to a place where you are more willing to accept what is and where you’re more willing to work WITH it vs. fighting against it.

But give yourself time to get there.

Transition is hard. It’s discombobulating and it’s uncomfortable.

But we CAN support ourselves.

I hope that some of the tools in this article will be supportive for you, and that you are able to find some comfort in these words.

You got this.