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Every major change in my life, without fail, involves the same rollercoaster of emotions: I’m excited and hopeful about the new opportunity. I’m anxious about living up to expectations — and about the things I don’t even know I’ll be expected to deliver on (because those always exist, right?). Next, I realize this isn’t quite what I expected, and I’m uncertain. Then, I’m certain this was a terrible idea and immediately regret and question why in the world I’d ever allow this change to happen.
Then, slowly — after a solid meltdown over how wrong I was about this new job/team sport/haircut — I start to adjust to the change, find my way in it, and come out hopeful and excited once again. It’s a long, immature journey; one that’s become routine enough for me to realize I’m doing it, though it hasn’t stopped that wave-of-regret phase from hitting me just the same. After all these years and some progress (I don’t, say, lock myself in a bathroom and cry, like I did on more than one occasion in high school), I had to know: Am I the only one who struggles with change this much?! Is this series of highs and lows in any way normal?! And either way, what can I do about it?
Turns out, I’m not alone. Psychologists have broken it down into three stages: (1) Resisting, when you negatively compare your new situation to the old one. (2) Exploring, as you gather info about this new phase in your life, making choices and connecting with others; and (3) Living in the New Old, where the change has become part of your day-to-day routine, normal enough that it’s now the “new old.”
“Everything will be alright in the end. So, if it is not alright, it is not yet the end.”
Just because there are three stages doesn’t mean they all occur evenly, or that the length of time it takes to adjust to a change is the same every time. For me, stage one seems to take up 30 percent of the transition, stage two is 65 percent, and the “new old” is the final five percent. Then it’s no longer a change; it’s just the new normal.
I kind of hoped knowing these stages would let me magically skip to stage three the next time something big changes in my life; it didn’t. But it has given me the peace of mind that can stop the stage-one freakout in its tracks. Things aren’t horribly wrong; this is just how the adjustment feels. I like the advice Psychology Today cribbed from The Exotic Marigold Hotel: “Everything will be alright in the end. So, if it is not alright, it is not yet the end.”
Photo by GREG KANTRA on Unsplash
