Have you ever felt like you were standing at the edge of yourself, looking back at who you used to be while simultaneously feeling pulled toward someone you’re becoming? That strange, uncomfortable space between versions of yourself? You’re not alone—and more importantly, you’re not broken. You’re transforming.
The Messengers of Change
Here’s what I’ve learned about life transitions: they rarely announce themselves with fanfare. Instead, they whisper through confusion. They speak through that restless feeling when your old routines suddenly feel suffocating. They show up as disorientation when the things that once brought you comfort now feel foreign.
These feelings aren’t signs that something’s wrong—they’re messengers telling you that something profound is shifting within you.
The Shedding Process
Think about a snake preparing to shed its skin. For days before the actual molting, the snake becomes restless, its colors dull, its eyes cloudy. It’s literally outgrowing its current form. The old skin that once protected and served it has become a limitation.
We go through the same process, just less visibly.
Maybe you spent years building walls around your heart after a difficult relationship, and those walls served you well—they helped you heal. But now you find yourself feeling trapped behind the very barriers that once kept you safe.
Or perhaps you’ve been the reliable one, the helper, the person everyone turns to. It gave you purpose and identity. But lately, you’ve been feeling depleted, yearning for someone to care for you the way you’ve cared for others.
When Our Shells Become Cages
The beautiful irony of human growth is that the very identities we create to survive one phase of life can become the prisons that prevent us from entering the next. The protective shell that sheltered us during our healing becomes the cage that confines our expansion.
This is why transitions feel so bittersweet. We’re not just changing—we’re grieving. We’re saying goodbye to a version of ourselves that served us well, even as we welcome the new self that’s emerging.
The In-Between Space
The hardest part isn’t the old self dying or the new self being born—it’s the liminal space between them. That uncomfortable period where you’re no longer who you were but not yet who you’re becoming.
In this space, you might feel:
- Confused about your desires and direction
- Disconnected from relationships that once felt natural
- Restless in situations that used to satisfy you
- Excited and terrified simultaneously
This is normal. This is necessary. This is transformation.
Learning from Nature’s Wisdom
I keep a small collection of molted feathers and shed snake skins on my desk—reminders that death and rebirth aren’t just human experiences. They’re nature’s way of evolving. Every creature that grows must eventually outgrow its current form.
The caterpillar doesn’t resist becoming a butterfly. The duck doesn’t mourn its old feathers. They surrender to the process with a trust that humans often struggle to find.
Embracing Your Next Chapter
So if you’re feeling the stirrings of change, if parts of your life feel unsettled, if you’re sensing that something within you is shifting—take a breath. You’re not falling apart. You’re coming together in a new way.
Honor the part of you that’s dying with gratitude for how it served you. Welcome the part that’s being born with curiosity about what it might become. And be gentle with yourself in the messy, beautiful space between who you were and who you’re becoming.
Your next chapter is waiting, and it’s going to be extraordinary.
What transitions are you experiencing right now? I’d love to hear about your own moments of transformation in the comments below.
