Coping with Change and Transitions
Let’s face it: no one volunteers for growth! Usually we are thrown into a situation that will require us to adapt, to change in some way, to make a transition. There is a reason for that phrase, “growing pains!”
All change and transitions trigger to some extent, anxiety. Will I be able to handle the change? How will I make new friends in a new place? Will I be able to do the job I was hired to do? Will I be able to manage my time at my new school? How will I cope with the rejection of my boyfriend or the loss of my parent? Some changes and transitions are devastating, and some are exciting, even though we may have some trepidation about the unknown.
How do we adapt?
Look at what you can control. A new move- packing, determining what goes where. Making a plan for meeting new people. A new school: getting to know the teachers/professors, identifying resources to help you, joining clubs to meet new people. A loss: remembering the good things and trusting that someday the pain of the loss will no longer accompany the good memories and they will be sweet.
Look at what you can’t control: much of what you can’t control is what you catastrophize that may never really happen: failing first semester, not making friends in my new location, blowing my first project at work. And some may happen, but you won’t know that yet. Let go of what you cannot control. And remember: that thinking about what you can’t control will not enable you to control it!!
Identify all the good things about the transition or change.
One way to reframe the discomfort of change: All good things are possible!