Shannon Brown
In January of the year I turned 40, I found myself voluntarily unemployed and with a significant amount of free time on my hands. After the first two weeks of house cleaning and organizing, leisurely drinking coffee, watching afternoon television, and spending a considerable amount of money shopping (much more than was prudent for an unemployed mother of 3), I was bored to tears. Feeling compelled to give careful consideration to the reasons why I left my job of 10 years and what I hoped to find in my next role, I sat down and began writing a "Memoir" of my first 40 years, reflecting on my life, considering where I was, and asking the question, "How did I get here, and is this where I want to be?"
That decision led me to the realization, and ultimately the acceptance, that I was not what I considered to be happy. In fact, I realized that what I had been was asleep. That day signaled the beginning of an almost 4-year journey that has fundamentally changed several of the major areas of my life including relationships, work, financial status, and home.
Contrary to popular belief, I did not wake up one morning and decide to end a relationship, embark upon earning a Ph.D., change jobs (again), and put my home on the market. Although all of those events have their seeds in that 40th birthday memoir, they certainly were not spur-of-the-moment decisions. In fact, those events represent the culmination of an undercurrent of dissatisfaction, an emptiness, a lack of purpose and meaning that began to boil over as I finished that memoir, causing me to me wake up and realize I didn’t recognize myself anymore. I was afraid. I was silent. I was unhappy. I was disengaged, and I felt like a spectator in my own life. I had forgotten how joy felt. I rarely laughed, and everything felt heavy and serious and obligatory, and my time was spent just getting through the day.
Little by little I began to take apart and examine the pieces of myself that seemed no longer to fit—a relationship wherein our core values did not match; a (new) job that paid well but left me feeling ineffective, unheard and unfulfilled; a long-ago set goal of earning a Ph.D. that was still unattained; and a house full of "stuff" that no longer brought me comfort and a feeling of home but instead felt like an overwhelming obligation.
I am a firm believer that "when the student is ready, the teacher will come," and as fate would have it, a year or so later I was given the opportunity to lead a seminar on personal change, and I based my presentation on some prior work I had done with William Bridges’ Managing Transitions. As I re-familiarized myself with Bridges’ ideas, I had that "a ha!" moment wherein I realized that those feelings were all signs of transitions—signs that things were ending even if I was still "in" them. Bridges describes the characteristics of endings as "disengagement, dis-identification, disenchantment, and disorientation," and this description perfectly captured the essence of my feelings.
Once I accepted that I was in transition, I began taking the necessary steps to complete those "endings." Last October began the season of what Bridges calls "the neutral zone," which is characterized by a time of intense reflection that can be almost spiritual. People in the neutral zone often spend significant time by themselves, and if they realize where they are, there is tremendous growth and learning that can come from this time of reflection and contemplation. Having recognized and accepted my position in the neutral zone, I spent that time thinking, writing, planning, and checking off the "steps" that were required for those endings and, ultimately, the beginnings that followed.
This October finds me through the neutral zone and well into the stage of "beginnings." That relationship has ended, and a time of solitude has begun. I began a Ph.D. program in April and started a new job in August. I packed up the pieces of my home to allow me to look at it anew, with the perspective of my new life and the new me, and I am still carefully considering which pieces of my past are still supportive of my future before they are invited into my new space.
As I approach the 4-year mark, I continue to look inward, reflecting on what I’ve learned about myself and what’s important in my life. I’ve learned that the right thing is often not the most comfortable thing. In fact, John Steinbeck once said "We spend our time searching for security and hate it when we get it," and Alan Cohen said, "…there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful." But I think Lynn Hall best described my experience with, "We did not change as we grew older; we just became more clearly ourselves."
As I sit here in the dawn of the early days of Fall, I realize that I have become more clearly myself, and I recognize that that this authentic self will continue to change as the seasons change and the journey continues to unfold before me. I believe I’ve grown comfortable with being uncomfortable, and I enter this season of new beginnings open to all possibilities, knowing that I am exactly where I am supposed to be.
Bridges, W. (1991). Managing transitions: Making the most of change. New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers.
