Making Changes --Me

It's been about six months since I have taken on this new lifestyle.  It was on the Summer Solstice that I officially cut down on seeing patients by about 90%.  Then I had the summer to play and frolic. That doesn't count as a real test of change as I easily did more of the things I did every summer, paddle and putt, bike and chase children across the sand and into the waves.  I can’t say that I suffered.

But as the leaves began to change, the daylight hours became fewer and the air took on a bit of a chill, I began to notice that I was waking up here, and I didn’t have to go there.  It was certainly easier, but it certainly felt strange.

I had gradually been working my way towards this time.  I had always wondered how I would do.  I had worked with  thousands of people, trying to help them make changes in their lives.  I talked to others about how they would feel weird and out of place, even when the changes were the ones they had wanted to make.  Many of my patients were about my age and I had gone through their retirement transition with them.  For many different reasons, they had a much rougher road to travel than I did.  I had worked with several men who had been in powerful positions in corporations or in government, and now they weren’t.  And endings like that don’t usually happen gracefully.

Mine was of my own choosing, at my own time, and with a plan of what I wanted to do next. 

Now, six, or nine months later, depending on when I start to count, I am just beginning to feel comfortable.  I am doing what I set out to do, which is trying to explain to others about how difficult change really is.  The future of that endeavor is not yet clear, but I feel I have made a good start, and hope to get some traction soon.

Still, it’s more difficult psychologically, being on the edges than being in the action.  My new pattern of living is certainly less stressful physically, but I have never really felt the free-floating anxiety that goes with such a lack of structure before. 

Thankfully, that is lifting, and I am feeling hopeful and invigorated.  You never feel as good as you do after you feel bad. Being able to see over the snowdrifts and believe that spring is coming has also given me an emotional boost. 

From this vantage point I can only encourage all of you to keep going through your own periods of transition, which I know, for many people is constant.  Change always brings with it a realigning of emotions, an adjustment, a new perspective.   Like our species, we are all evolving and adapting in our own lives.   If we can’t change we risk extinction. 

That doesn’t sound like fun.