In Transition

I was at a monthly Meetup group this week and of course, we all gave our 30-second elevator speech of who we are, yada yada…  Me:  I am so and so and my business is In Transition.  Ooh!  What’s that? What does your business do?  And sheepishly I say, nothing.  I am IN transition.  Meaning:  I am not working right now.

 

It’s hard to own this.  Why?  Because I have always worked.  Work defined me.  What defines me now?  Why can’t I enthusiastically announce to the world that I am not working and damn it, it’s okay?  At least for the moment.  Why CAN’T I be in transition?   Why can’t I take the time to figure things out?  Why must I have the answer to my life when I just don’t?

That place where nothing is happening is called the liminal stage and damn it, that is where I am right now.  I should call my business The Liminal Stage.  That sounds pretty impressive, doesn’t it?  My work right now is to amass information, go over the past 7 years (the number 7 means refinement – okay, so I am busy refining myself.  The number seven symbolizes God's perfection. – okay, this is pretty intense right here!) This is when we take an inventory of our life. It’s a time of spiritual questioning and review of our life purpose.  Isn’t that a full time job in itself?  I think so.  So just lay off me!  Wait, I need to lay off myself, for I am the only one badgering me to get it together already and figure out the next step.

What is this transition and who let it in?  I have spent a lifetime as a serial entrepreneur, always dreaming and working on the next thing for my growth, always overlapping my work, never a break in between.

My business is Liminal Transitions.  That sounds even better.  It sounds business-like, right? Authentic.  What do you do? I sit in the nothingness while all the pieces of me banter and fret and cajole their way into creating the next me.  They will let me know when the work is done.  My business is to not get in the way with worry and negative thoughts.  My job is easy in all this.  I just sit still in the silence, in the quiet, knowing that within that quiet, a ruckus is vamping up and soon enough will make so much noise that I will be forced to engage in something.

The wait is agonizing.  All I do is feed the ideas and wait, like a mother with her newborn.  Eat and sleep.  Eat and sleep.  And grow.  And grow.

I can’t do this much longer.

But I can feel the growth.  There are the growing pains that come with working through the blockages, breaking loose the long held self-defeating voices of long ago.  I AM! I AM, I cry within.  I, who fights everything, must be still while this raging goes on within.  This is excruciating for someone who has never sat still for anything; the person who’s monkey brain has grown to gorilla brain; no, King Kong brain.  How do you keep King Kong quieted?  You can’t, of course.

And so I sit, feeding this silent activity, resting and waiting for that moment when I burst forth, full speed ahead.  Again.  Oh, it will be grand, that is certain.  My biggest thing ever, whatever that is.  I am not done yet.

I am Transition.  A work in progress.  Not yet defined.  But magnificent.