Right now, my life is being rearranged. Moving is a slow, sometimes maddening process, punctuated by small glimmers of excitement. But transitions are like that. Moving from old to new isn’t clean. There is a shedding that comes first—a letting go.
And it’s interesting what falls away in that process: daily habits, carefully laid plans, the extra towels I’ve held onto for years, things that once seemed so important.
Transitions have always been messy for me. I like routines. I find comfort in rhythms and familiar patterns. Change is messy. And it demands a lot. It asks us to loosen our grip on some things, prioritize others, and remain open to discovering something new along the way.
I’ve been thinking lately about these liminal places, the thresholds that carry us from one season of life to another, one place to another, and how important it is to let go along the way.
The idea of “letting go” has become a bit of a cliché: “Just let that shit go.” 🙄 But the idea itself is ancient. In yoga philosophy, non-attachment and surrender are considered essential practices.
A lifetime of yoga has ingrained these concepts in me, though I still struggle with them every day.
One of my greatest challenges has been learning to accept what is instead of clinging to what I think should be—how the day should unfold, what should happen next, how life should look.
It’s easy to say change is inevitable. It’s much harder to live as though that’s true.
Another lesson I keep returning to is becoming more comfortable with discomfort. Pain, uncertainty, and upheaval are inevitable parts of being alive, but they are also impermanent. Nothing stays exactly as it is.
Can we surrender to that truth? Can we trust that the difficult seasons make the joyful ones shine brighter?
The solstice has recently passed, a full moon is coming, and there is something about this rhythm of nature that echoes what I’m feeling these days: filling up, letting go, beginning again. Full moons are often seen as a time of abundance and release, an opportunity to set down what we no longer need. The solstice and the full moon both mark a crossing—a reminder that nature, too, moves through thresholds.
With this in mind, I invite you to try one (or both!) of these writing prompts:
Thresholds are places of both ending and beginning. Write about an in-between season in you or your character’s life. Describe a doorway. What does that doorway represent? What is significant about crossing over? What is left behind, what is gained?
What might you need to let go of these days? What deserves a fresh start in your life? And where might you practice being content with things as they are, even as they change?
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