Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes

by William Bridges

One of the benefits to reviewing your experience of endings is to see how often they have cleared the ground for unexpected beginnings. But reviewing these elements in your past may also uncover the times when the ending did not provide a starting point, as well as times when you started a new journey without unpacking your baggage from the old one. Right now, at this new transition point in your life, remember some of these aborted transition points from your past. Poke around among them as you might explore an old house you once lived in. Some of these unfinished transitions might be ones that you could still complete, and if you did that, you would bring more energy and less anxiety to your present situation as a result. Completion may involve no more than a belated farewell, a letter, or a call to someone. It may involve an inner relinquishment of someone who outwardly you left behind years ago, or some old image of yourself, or some outlived dream or outworn belief that you have kept in your baggage long past its time. You’ll travel more easily if you lighten your load.