Time to Start Making a Transition in Your Life?

JT - She knew this transition was not about becoming someone better, but about finally allowing herself to become who she'd always been.

I don’t know about you, however many of us have been forced to rethink life in the past few years – how we show up for it and what really matters to us and what our essential needs are. I have had a few of these experiences in life and I call them turning points. These “turning points” have helped me continue to u-turn and reconnect back to me and my dreams and today, that is what I wanted to discuss.

What is a Turning Point?

Turning points have a few definitions and meanings and they include –

  • “a time at which a decisive change in a situation occurs, especially one with beneficial results.” ~ Google
  • “the time at which a situation starts to change in an important way” ~ Cambridge Dictionary
  • “a point at which a decisive change takes place; critical point; crisis” ~ Dictionary.com
  • “It is a time at which an important change takes place which affects the future of a person or thing.” ~ Collins Dictionary
  • “The turning point in the process of growing up is when you discover the core of strength within you that survives all hurt.” ~ Max Lerner

If I had to choose how I refer to a turning point it is a combination of the last two points (which is why I am a fan of courage and whole-heartedness).

Examples of Turning Points in Life

Turning points can happen at any time within life. They may be planned or unplanned. Some examples of turning points include –

  • a woman finding out she is pregnant or the birth of a child,
  • experiencing and feeling undervalued / unappreciated in your workplace,
  • realising you are not committing fully to living your own whole-hearted life,
  • an individual leaving a workplace and starting a business,
  • realising something has to change (i.e. decreasing your stress load),
  • someone finding out they have a health diagnosis / challenge (i.e. cancer), and
  • a person getting married, divorced or losing a partner.

Form me personally, some of my turning points have been injuries in my life (including finishing professional tennis), feeling undervalued / unappreciated and starting my own business after mindfulness and coaching found me.

Making a Transition…

After I finished playing professional tennis, I made a very conscious choice to find another career path away from the sport. There were many reasons for this and maybe one day I will share more about that. This was a big transition, however there was little support around that in 1997 when I finished sport. Later on I realised I had made a transition over that time (although not consciously).

According to William Bridges in his book Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change, transitions are psychological and have a 3 phase process (see below), whereas change is situational. In his books Transitions: Making Sense of Life’s Changes and Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change, he talks about the process of transition having three phases –

  1. an ending (letting go of a the old ways and identity);
  2. a neutral zone (the confusing or distressing area of in-betweenness); and
  3. a new beginning (launching in to a new identity, new sense of purpose etc.).
3 Phases of Transition

Time to Start Making a Transition in Your Life?

Have you ever had a deep sense that there is something more to life? Maybe something is calling you from within to start your own business or turn your passion in to a side business? Are you ready to start releasing the old ways of doing things to create a new beginning?

Yes, you can wait for a turning point in your life, or you can simply make a choice to start with little steps and make a u-turn back to you and your dreams (not someone else’s). I used to think that I needed to have all my ducks in a row before I starting making transitions and changes. However, now I know that wasn’t true, I needed to learn to unify all of my life.

You have a gift and the world needs your gifts. Yes it is messy, challenging and takes time, courage and effort. However, in the end it is worth it and for me personally I want to live with no regrets.

Over to You…

What tiny compassionate and I’mPowering choices can you take today to mover you one step towards your dreams? Maybe you are ready to let go of –

  1. what people think about you and start to cultivate authenticity,
  2. perfectionism and start to cultivate self-compassion,
  3. numbing and powerlessness and start to cultivate a resilient spirit,
  4. scarcity and start to cultivate gratitude and joy,
  5. the need for certainty and start to cultivate intuition and a trusting faith,
  6. comparison and start to cultivate creativity,
  7. exhaustion as a status symbol and productivity as self-worth and start to cultivate play and rest,
  8. anxiety as a lifestyle and start to cultivate calm and stillness,
  9. self-doubt and ‘supposed to’ and start to cultivate meaningful work, and
  10. being cool and always in control’ and start to cultivate laughter, song and dance.

Feel free to share them below!

If you are ready make a whole-hearted promise to you and take the next step towards freedom and opening your heartwhy not join our Toolkit?

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