The Scariest Place You've Ever Been (That You've Been Before)

I remember the day I revoked my teaching licence. It was not a dramatic moment. No one applauded. No one handed me a certificate. I just filled out a form, mailed it, and felt the ground shift beneath my feet.

For forty years, I had been a teacher. That was who I was. Not just what I did. And in that moment, I was neither teacher nor anything else. I was betwixt and between. I was in liminal space.

Liminal space is the place we inhabit during any significant transition. It is the time when we have left what was, but have not yet arrived at what will be. It can be physical, a hallway, a waiting room, an empty parking lot. But more often for us, it is emotional: the space between one job and the next, one relationship and the next, one version of ourselves and the next.

And it is terrifying.

Think about the transitions you have lived through. Moving from one home to another. Retiring from a career you loved. Becoming an empty nester. Losing a spouse. Turning sixty, then sixty-five, then seventy.

In each of these moments, you were in liminal space. You had left the familiar but had not yet found the new. You were no longer who you were, but not yet who you would become.

And yet, here you are. You survived. More than that, you grew.

The fear of liminal space is real. Most of us will do almost anything to avoid it. We stay in jobs we hate. We postpone difficult conversations. We keep living in a house that no longer fits. We hold on to the old identity because it is safer than facing the unknown.

But here is what I have learned: the liminal space is where the magic happens. It is where we shed our old skin. It is where we discover who we are when we are not defined by our roles. It is where creativity, possibility, and transformation live.

The next time you find yourself in that uncomfortable in-between place, try something different. Instead of rushing through it, try to inhabit it. Instead of avoiding the uncertainty, try to accept it. Instead of asking "When will this end?" try asking "What might I discover here?"

You have been here before. You have survived. And you have grown.What transition are you in right now? What would it feel like to stop rushing through it and instead settle into it, just for a moment?