A few weeks ago I went to the Young Adult retreat with the Vineyard church and went to the session led by Alex VanRiesen called "Transitions". He shared about William Bridges' book creatively titled Transitions. Bridges points out that every transition has three stages 1) an ending 2) a neutral zone and 3) a beginning. Honestly, my first reaction was "Well, duh! When you go through a change, something has to end and something has to begin." and I glossed over the notion of the neutral zone (which as it turns out, is what many of us tend to do when we actually go through transitions). Reality is, the neutral zone is a viable step in making a healthy transition. The neutral zone is where we give ourselves the space and time for our internal reality to catch up and/or respond to the changes in external events/circumstances.
Even though initially I didn't really want to go to this break-out session, I am grateful that I did go. (My thought process went like this: "I am excited to go to Tanzania and I feel like I am ready for this change. I am not really sure I am going to get anything useful out of this session." Ah, human pride, there I go again thinking I know everything already!) The conversations we had in that session reframed my thinking and spurred me to be intentional about facing the upcoming transition. It is pretty obvious where the three stages line up for me. My ending is coming with the end of four years of teaching at Westmont High School as well as moving out of the apartment I have lived in during that time. My neutral zone is the two months that I have staying with family and friends in Colorado. My beginning is going to teach in Tanzania.
To be honest. this ending has been much rougher than I anticipated. As much as I want to go and as much as I know that now is the right time to go, I do have a hard time leaving somethings behind. There have been mornings that I have been nauseous and feel like throwing up, there have been times that I drive to work crying, and there are other times that I am in flat out denial that anything is going to be different. When I spend time thinking about all the friendships and the people that I won't get to see on a regular basis, I become overwhelmed to the point that I can't do anything. It helps me to know that this is normal and that I need to give credence to these feelings. In fact, that it is much healthier that I am letting these feelings come out at the right time!
What has been remarkable is to see how God has brought different people at the right moment to help me process my feelings. For example, one morning I was in the denial stage and trying to suppress everything when one of my friends looked me in the eye and said "Lindsey, I feel like I need to say this prayer over you." The words that the Spirit gave her to say touched on many of my emotions that I had buried deep and it all came bubbling up. Another morning, I was feeling incredibly lonely and sad and that is the morning that one of my closest teaching friends came by my room early in the day and gave me a hand-knitted scarf she had made for me and we made plans for dinner that evening. God has been so good at bringing people to encourage me and walk me through this change.
In order for there to be a beginning, there has to be an ending. Let this be an ending that ends well!
Papa, I thank You for transitions.I thank You that You are the one who designed change and that change is healthy. I thank You for Jesus who went through the biggest transition on the cross and because of that transition from death to life, we have access to You. You are the best Guide during these transitions and I thank You for the wisdom and support You have given me!
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