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The above describes well the feeling that so often accompanies transition or major life change. Graduations, marriages, attending a new school, changes in relationships, relocation, changes in jobs, aging, retirement, children leaving the nest, declining physical abilities and the loss of a spouse are all examples of transitions that can throw us into a state of disorientation and confusion.

It is interesting to note that, in the professional literature, the subject of transition and change is addressed in the same way as grief and bereavement. It suggests that there is a similar process that we all go through when we are in transition—whether that transition is major (like the loss of a loved one); minimal (like getting out of bed in the morning) or developmental (like graduating from school, accepting a promotion or going from one stage of development to another).

As we work with change in our lives, it is important to take an inventory as to how we classify those changes. Do we experience them as major, minimal or developmental? What is major to one person may be minimal to another. Regardless, the process is the same and something each of us experiences with every transition. It has been said, in fact, that if we want to know how we will react to our own death when the time comes, to just take note of how we get out of bed in the morning—the degree of change in these two transitions is dramatically different, and yet the style in which we navigate the change may be the same.

Transitions always begin with endings and end with beginnings. As with the trapeze artist who lets go of one bar and reaches for the next, it is that in-between time that can be frightening and disorienting—a time where we may feel we’ve lost our moorings and spiritual grounding. But in this confusing and seemingly fallow time, we have the opportunity for tremendous growth if we can allow ourselves to surrender to the feelings of confusion, uncertainty and disorientation—of being on a journey and not knowing the final destination.

It is also helpful to try and gain some understanding about how we have historically related to change. Think for a moment. What was change like when you were growing up? What are the ways in which your family brought situations to a close? What did you learn about putting to rest a special time? Were endings acknowledged or denied? Did your family, as Carl Jung said in his description of denial, “pretend not to know that they knew what they knew?”

The late Charles Schultz gave us much to think about in the wisdom of Peanuts. In a favorite cartoon, Lucy had not been in a baseball game for several seasons. She pleaded to go back and play center field. As fate would have it, someone hit a high fly her way. She looked into the sky. She put her glove out. And she missed. As she sauntered up for a conversation with Charlie Brown, she said, “I’m sorry. I looked up. I thought I had it. And suddenly. . .I remembered all the other ones I’d missed. The past got in my eyes.” We need not allow the past to get in our eyes if the ways we have learned to cope with change are not healthy and transformative.

To deal with the inevitable ending that is incumbent with any change, we must, first, disengage—to acknowledge what is ending and to grieve what we can no longer be connected to. Sometimes the change is of our choosing and other times it is a situation that has been decided for us. As we follow the passion and death of Jesus, we see even his inability to hold on to what was. And over the centuries, it was thought important to retain in scripture the words uttered by the Christ at his moment of surrender: “It is finished.” Might we ask Jesus to be with us when we lack the courage to say that something is finished?

The second task of ending is to dis-identify with what we had previously identified with so strongly. This involves deciding which routines and relationships we will keep and which ones we will let go of.

Third, we must address our disenchantment or the limbo we feel when the world is no longer real as it used to be. Our previous routines and relationships acted as a container within which to order a complex world. Without these anchors, we wonder, where will we find safety, acceptance and meaning?

Fourth, we must surrender to a period of disorientation. It is only through submitting to a period of confusion and lost-ness that we are ultimately available to become re-oriented. In the words of poet, Robert Frost: “you must be lost enough to find yourself.”

And so this is how we enter the in-between zone that marks an ending and is before a beginning, the time after goodbye and before hello. Ultimately, through the grace of God, we are able to realign, re-image, re-focus, rejuvenate and re-invest in relationships and experiences that are only available to us after the letting go.

Example, if not comfort, can be found in the story of the call of Abram recorded in the book of Genesis. Here God tells Abram to leave all that he has, all that he’s accomplished, for a land that God would eventually show him. Abram went as the Lord directed and, ultimately, grew in his understanding of his part in God’s plan: