The Power of Transitions
As I sit composing this week’s quote and comment, I’m reminded of a perspective that I find to be extremely valuable in creating the life we want… the potential of transitions. You see, when we are in the middle of some event, job, relationship, argument, or experience, it is often difficult to see what is truly going on. Our perception is often so colored by our emotions, reactions, fears, and desires that true awareness and conscious choice escapes us.
I’m sure most of us can think back to one of these experiences where we did something or said something, or maybe failed to do or say something because the experience itself seemed so all encompassing.
Afterward, however, there often comes a period of time where we can look back with more clarity. We can see how we reacted not as some indication that there is something wrong with us, or how some person or situation “made us feel,” but instead as good information about the choices we made, or how our interpretation of events effected our emotions and experience.
Similarly, we can also identify the time just before the event and imagine how our experience may have been different if we had become more purposeful with respect to how we wanted to go into the experience… who we wanted to be, or the qualities and/or characteristics we wanted to bring to the experience
These are life’s transitions… the time between times that can be a powerful opportunity to become more influential in our life if only we will recognize and use them as such. Again, these can be a moment between moments, the experience of moving from one room to another at home or at work, the time between going or coming from one experience to another (the drive to work, or home from work for example), the period of time between conversations, between meetings, or even between relationships or careers.
Regardless of the length of the “before” or “after,” seeing these periods as golden opportunities for awareness and purposefulness can allow us to use them in service of our highest purpose, or the ability to determine whether we were responding, or entering into a situation in a way that makes the statement we want to make about who we are, or in a way we would teach or recommend to a child or someone we loved.
For you see, it is our choices that determine our experience of life! And when we can use the transitions in our lives as opportunities to make these purposeful choices, the potential that we will learn from the past, and/or go into “what’s next” in the “Top of the Mind” or in a way that we would recommend to someone we loved is greatly enhanced.
~ All the best, Dr. Bill