Endings
I was never great at endings.…
My much younger self would run away, not knowing how to accept an ending that was painful and unexpected. As an adolescent, I ran away from home, skipped school, found plenty of substances to manage my pain and even cleverly fled from several residential treatment programs. I was always looking for an escape. I had so much angst and anger bottled up I felt uniquely burdened, believing no one would ever understand the weight of what I carried. I didn’t know how to talk about what was happening inside of me and there wasn’t really anyone willing to listen. Turns out that’s not a very unique story. Most young people feel this way.
Then, as a form of healing my fifteen year old self started running as a discipline. It did not come naturally to me. I had to work hard and struggled with the effort. I still remember the day I ran my first five miles, the hardest run I had ever completed. It was a huge accomplishment at that time. Even then, I had a vague sense that I was taking my maladaptive reactivity–running away– and transforming it into a source of power. As the years have passed my running, my need to run, has served as a path to freedom and self-discovery, a time to explore and process my feelings rather than escaping from them.
We all have to face decisions about when and how to end something.
Partnerships, jobs, friendships, school, illness, therapy, where we live, who we live with, situations of every kind have an ending that we may be certain of or that will catch us by surprise. We may know when something is scheduled to end, like school, or we might have to determine an ending based on persistent feelings of discontent. Decisions were made that no longer serve us. People and relationships change and we find ourselves struggling with previous commitments that now feel wrong. This is a natural part of life, not an indication of failure. Facing a deep truth, while painful, requires courage and self-acceptance.
I have stayed in relationships longer than I should have, scared to imagine a new life and not knowing how to face a painful and disruptive ending. I have ended relationships while still loving someone, accepting a difficult decision had to be made. Endings are often brutal and heartbreaking. It’s easy to avoid ending something that we know will cause pain to the people we love the most. It’s tempting to stay in the comfort zone of what is familiar, ignoring the foreboding signs that all is not ok. Endings can be both distressing and traumatizing.
When an ending occurs, there is a loss of identity.
No longer student, married, single, employed, stable, healthy, the end creates a loss or shift in how we know ourselves. When a traumatic event occurs, this is even more jarring and destabilizing. The world and life we knew, the familiar routine is gone. Even celebrations, like having a new baby or graduating high school, while anticipated with joy and excitement, result in a mixture of joy and discomfort, an ending of who you were before. The anticipatory you.
The liminal space between what is finished and what comes next is a potent time for reverie, as the need to grieve, process, and realign is necessary. It can be tempting to rush through this period, ignoring the opportunity for reflection. Change is disruptive. Our hearts and minds need time to land in what has occurred while we survey the new landscape. Our bodies, deeply intuitive and attuned, may need more rest, solitude or meditative practices. Or conversely, we may need to play hard and spend an abundance of time with friends, in nature or discovering parts of ourselves that have been offline for awhile.
Tune into your own needs and desires during this time of transition. Becoming more self-aware will guide you as your life changes course.
Endings are liberating.
Thinking of my own life, almost all difficult endings were followed by a period of renewed growth. There is a lot of research being done currently on post-traumatic growth, which is essentially recognizing that even after major trauma, our healing can transport us to a better self than who we were pre-trauma. Healing is never about getting back to who we were, it’s about discovering who we are now, with our battle scars and thwarted plans in tow.
In the second half of life (well on my way!), it seems that we are being asked to face endings with greater acceptance and clarity. For me, avoiding the discomfort of a hard decision is no longer tolerable. I also know that things can change suddenly and my adaptability is vital. I have become more intentional and conscious of when it’s time for an ending and hope to find the grace to manage the unexpected twists and turns that are inevitable.
