Liminal Space

The gap in between; the waiting, the yearning

Thank you always for being here. And if you’re new, welcome. It’s been a hot minute, but we’re back up.

For months, I stood at crossroads. The space between all that came before and what happens next. The point in a novel where a new story begins. I was done with my graduate program and wasn’t sure what else I would do. Getting an MBA was the hallmark of my goals for a long time. And now, now that it was done, what now?

One of the hardest places to be is in a liminal space, a gateway between two stages. A time of transition and the birth of something new. Unsure when to push harder or find some rest. But uncertainty can be a good thing. When things aren’t certain, there are many possibilities.

“I find that it works much better for me if I grope my way forward blindly. The less you know about what's going to happen, the more room there is for your imagination.”

-Sigrid Nunez

I knew this time was pivotal so I decided I would take a break, and give myself the liberty of having free time. No full-time commitments, no place I had to be. I would travel, try new things, reconnect with friends, write a lot more, and then get a job.

But this wasn’t the case. I struggled to write, I had the words but not the song. There was the nerve-racking task of wondering what to do with each day. Socialisation became a burden. Friends weren’t available for coffee or a chat on a Tuesday afternoon as they had jobs. The boredom was killing me. I considered moving to a new city for another fresh start, but I knew I wasn’t ready for that yet; it would throw me off even further. I wanted solidity, not shifting sand.

I am a person of routines. Structure brings me the clarity I need for daily living. My thought process is mostly methodical. I tend to avoid ambiguous situations. I prefer plans laid out, simple and easy to follow. Everything happening at the time seemed ambiguous to me and it was hard for me to just be.

Time moved like waves across a seabed. Weeks turned into months and it felt like being in limbo, waiting for something to happen. Sometimes I felt energetic, or like an alchemist turning whatever this season was into something valuable. Other times I felt flustered, wishing I could skip to the better part. I wasn’t going through any major difficulty, I wasn’t depressed or unenthusiastic about life. Things simply weren’t moving at the pace I would have liked and I didn’t know what else to do about it.

But I learned something important in this time.

Growth and change and progress can happen even when it seems like nothing is happening on the surface. Like a desert where most of the change happens underneath. I realized that the sheer audacity to show up daily was enough, to do all that needed to be done for that day. It takes courage to barrel through hard days and deal with disappointments and uncertainty. Feelings of inadequacy can come even in moments of sufficiency. Comfort can be found in discomfort. There are times where it is necessary to pause and witness the unfolding instead of rushing towards the next task.

Life looks much different for me now and I am a beginner again in a different capacity. Sometimes I still feel nervous about what could happen and how quickly things change. But I believe that our life can be our greatest artwork, and I find comfort in knowing that the art of becoming is an act of time. Every day presents the opportunity to create yourself. Through varying moments of hope and despair, through waiting and yearning, through periods of uncertainty and discomfort, somewhere in between all of that, magic happens.

Quote of the Week

“I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized.”

-Haim G. Ginott