As we near the end of the year, and this series on learning to love liminality, I want to land in a highly pragmatic place: all of us are in between things all the time, so we might as well learn to like it here!
Transitions are the norm, not the exception. In fact, we’re almost always navigating more than one at a time. In a recent study I commissioned with 1,219 midlife participants across Canada and the US, 40% reported being in the midst of more than one transition.
I often think of someone standing on a beach at the edge of the ocean, waiting for the waves to calm down before getting into the water. They might be waiting a very long time! Compare them to a person who has learned to surf, and can therefore dive right in, regardless of the weather.
(Or the person who, in late 2020, told me they “don’t do digital” — and I blurted out, “Happy retirement then!”)
Keeping our head down and waiting for the storm to pass is not a sustainable solution.
Thankfully, we’re not alone in this wobbly territory — almost everyone you know is right there with you, most of the time. Liminal spaces are where all the cool kids hang out — because the alternative is actually pretty boring. Wouldn’t you rather spend time with people trying to figure out their next adventure and getting to know who they are at this new stage of their lives than perpetually staying the same as they’ve always been?
So that puts you in the ‘cool kid’ category too. It feels messy when you’re in it, but the alternative is worse. You aren’t stuck and you aren’t alone. There are worse places to be!
If you’re curious about the previous perspectives in this series, you can find them here. We’ve explored raising our tolerance for messiness, setting reasonable expectations, choosing our preferred approach, and leaning into multiple possibilities. We’ll wrap it up next week with some scaffolding to provide structure — perfect timing heading into the new year.