Managing Our Expectations: Seasons, Stages & Transitions
Today is the last in our five-part series where we've been responding to your answers to our poll question: "What is the biggest challenge you face right now in living a more unhurried life?"
We received a whole grouping of answers that were all about life's seasons, stages and transitions.
" We have the mom with young children at home trying to figure out how anything resembling unhurried time is even possible.
" There's the student who is away at college, who feels the pressures of both school and family issues at home.
" We have the parents of the college students who are feeling the effects of the empty nest.
" There are those in the sandwich generation - caring for both aging parents and children at home.
We've also heard from people who say that they can't meet with God in the same ways they used to. They keep working at an old practice that just doesn't seem fruitful anymore. Or they simply cannot make their way to what used to fill their soul.
This conversation about seasons, stages and transitions can help us at any point in our lives.
I (Gem) remember, at one point, well into my 30s, we were talking and I realized that we kept using the word "transition." "Oh, it feels like we are in another transition." We came to the realization that life was transition. We were always moving from season or stage to the next.
Maybe our lives aren't about settling into a destination as much as continuing on a fruitful journey.
So, rather than coming up with dozens of specific scenarios about people facing different seasons, stages or transitions, we're going to try to give a vision for the over-arching reality of what these seasons can feel like. Especially as it relates to when we try to carry standards, or expectations, or even practices from one season into the next. We are tempted to see our lives as monolithic. What works for me now will work for me always. Listen in for more on this…
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Alan consults and coaches leaders and their organizations in the U.S. and around the world, helping them work towards long-term productivity that lasts rather than settling for quick fixes that don’t. He is the award-winning author of five books, including An Unhurried Life, An Unhurried Leader, and A Non-Anxious Life.
Gem is the co-host of the Unhurried Living Podcast as well as the author of Hold That Thought and co-author of What Does Your Soul Love? Her work has appeared in Propel Women and Our Daily Bread.
