The Path to New Beginnings

July 1, 2021

“If we don't change, we don't grow. If we don't grow, we aren't really living.” – Gail Sheehy

Bridges’ Transition Model defines three stages that individuals experience during change:

Ending What Currently Is
The Neutral Zone
The New Beginning

Endings

Transition starts with an ending. The first phase begins when we identify what we are losing and how to manage these losses.

Neutral Zone

The next step of transition comes after letting go, the in-between time when the old is gone and the new hasn’t begun yet. This is the space and place where we need to realign, create new patterns and sense of identity. It is core to the transition process. We spend a lot of time in the neutral zone. While it feels like we’re stuck, it is fertile ground that prepares us to move fully into new beginnings. Be patient and keep moving through to get to the third stage.

New Beginnings

Beginnings require a shift in perspective, understanding and attitudes. Releasing the old, we open to the new with a renewed energy that propels us into a new direction with a fresh identity.

“You can’t follow the thread of your life very far before you find “the past” changing. Things that you haven’t remembered in years reappear, and things that you’ve always thought were so turn out to be not so at all. If the past isn’t the way you thought it was, then the present isn’t, either. Letting go of that present may make it easier to conceive of a new future.”― William Bridges, Transitions: Making Sense of Life's Changes

Keep trying new things each day, growing and on the road to new beginnings.

“Always do your best. What you plant now, you will harvest later.”

-OG MANDINO

Plant Seeds, Reap Harvest

March 1, 2020

“How noble and good everyone could be if at the end of the day they were to review their own behavior and weigh up the rights and wrongs. They would automatically try to do better at the start of each new day, and after a while, would certainly accomplish a great deal.” – Anne Frank

What are you doing with your time? Take inventory, be intentional, plant seeds and reap the harvest. Here are 3 “doable” things to start this week:

Creating Oneself Endlessly

December 27, 2019

“If every day is an awakening, you will never grow old. You will just keep growing.” – Gail Sheehy, New Passages

As the clock rushes from 2019 to 2020 – the start of a new decade – take full inventory, both the wins and losses. It’s rarely one or the other. Celebrate the wins and find the lessons in the loss. Our natural inclination is to put more weight on the loss than the gain. When we dare to awaken to the gifts in each day, we keep growing, embracing change and transitions that are the fabric of life.

According Managing Transitions author William Bridges, there are three phases to transition:

Ending – letting go of old ways and old identity;
The Neutral Zone – in between time with the old being gone and the new not fully arrived;
The New Beginning – coming out fully of transition into a new beginning with a new energy and purpose.

Many days feel like we’re stuck in the neutral zone, clinging to old ways and the past. Accepting and diving right in the middle of change can move us to new beginnings, new stories. Resistance delays the gift of new beginnings.