Life transitions enter your awareness with endings. Children leaving for school or getting married, having a book published, coming home after a trip, or losing a parent can all be difficult experiences that pull up feelings of vulnerability and confusion.
Letting go of the familiar and stepping into uncertainty begins the liminal exploration of re-examining your way of being. The space between this and that; crossing the threshold from the old place to the new; friends that come and go after a visit, shifting from an active state to a more contemplative one is the liminal process. But the pull into the unknown is too strong to do anything else. Unexpected circumstances may precede the process of a personal inner shift that is neuro-psychological and accompanied by a natural resistance. The mind loves the familiar but demands the novel and then seeks calm serenity.
The inner experience is a reckoning of what to do; of who to be, and how to define personal meaning. At times you feel an inner desire to make a change in your work, your relationship, your place of living; other times you are plunged into a change through illness, loss, or intense curiosity to understand your self at a deeper level. Your emotional response to change can be so surprisingly intense that you don’t quite know what to do. Grief can be overwhelming, fear stands in the way of sleep, and uncertainty and feeling helpless arise to block discerning a course of action. But when you pause in the busyness of each day, a deep part of yourself emerges that yearns for transformation into something more meaningful.
Trusting the process of change by understanding the stages of change is important. Acknowledging the Ending state first allows you to move into accepting the Not Knowing space between before and after a change. By going deeply into yourself through meditation, walking in nature, or sitting by the ocean, you facilitate the process of Transformation, the third state, of even your neural processes.
Most inner change occurs at a deeper level of consciousness. Deeper states reprogram the mind. The liminal state; that space between beta and delta, brain frequencies, is a source of both creativity and the place where old beliefs often based in trauma are transformed. It is the sacred inner space that heals. By practicing deep states of mind, you can:
Resolve past issues and troubling inner conflicts
Expand awareness
Change a habit
Set goals and achieve them
Improve a skill through mental practice
Tap into immense creativity
Improve a relationship by developing “in-sight” into your projections
Understanding what Life purpose calls you
Prepare your mind for a new experience or adventure
As you sit with feet on the floor, take yourself down to the edge of sleep and become as quiet as possible. If your mind frets or tries to solve problems, let the thoughts go and focus on the inner sanctuary within you. You may want to focus on the imaginary space between your ears or the space in your abdomen or your pleasant memories of observing a blue ocean move gently over the shore. Sit in that liminal space as long as you can before returning to the room. And when you come back, notice what is different inside you.
“TRANSITION IS NOT JUST A NICE WAY TO SAY CHANGE. IT IS THE INNER PROCESS THROUGH WHICH PEOPLE COME TO TERMS WITH A CHANGE, AS THEY LET GO OF THE WAY THINGS USED TO BE AND REORIENT THEMSELVES TO THE WAY THAT THINGS ARE NOW.” — WILLIAM BRIDGES
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