Between the shoulders of summer and fall lies my favorite ‘tween’ season. The bugs are less common in the cooler evening air while the biological clocks of the furry animals signal a coat change in preparation for the winter to come. The days, in the Great South anyway, continue to impart their only slightly diminished chaleur upon those who brave the full midday sun while the gentle evening breeze begs longer sleeves and if you’re lucky, a light sweater.
Transitions are an important part of the days of our lives, and a well-handled transition – be it for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness or in health – plants the seeds for a successful future harvest.
I would venture to say that the majority of new beginnings are spoiled before most people even recognize that change is in the air. Human beings have, broadly speaking, insulted themselves from the seasonal shifts that condition to varying degrees virtually every other process in the natural kingdom. Call it progress, human ingenuity or whatever you’d like, we are slowly isolating ourselves from the world we inhabit in ways that are ofttimes useful, but occasionally dangerous.
One of the unintended side-effects of the technological advances of our recent era is the loss of sensitivity to cycles and seasons that govern every creative process. If you think about your own life, there was first conception, followed by birth, childhood, adolescence and your adult years (if you’ve made it that far yet). Every new business follows a similar pattern, as does the creation of a family, the execution of a project or the provision of a meal.
Participation in creative cycles is often subconscious and rare is the individual who has a conscious awareness of the phase in the process he or she is in at any given point in time. Some cycles are short, lasting only seconds, such as the reaction taken in response to a flat tire in your car while speeding down the highway, while others might have longer periods, such as the earth’s orbit around the sun. All cycles have a beginning, a middle and an end.
There is the old question: “If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” From the standpoint of the creative cycles, they work out whether or not there is human perception of the process. Perhaps this is why the purpose of life has been so mysterious to people through the ages?
The first step in learning to work more effectively with the forces that govern the various phases of these cycles is awareness. What are the phases? I outlined the basics above: conception, birth, childhood, adolescence and adulthood. Where are you in your life? What about your career? And relative to the actualization of your biggest dreams?
As with human growth and development, a different approach is required in each phase of development. You don’t deal with a start-up business the same way you would a well-established business for the same reason that you don’t treat a three year old boy like a forty year old man. Once you recognize where you are in the process, you can begin to ask yourself “am I handling this phase wisely?” You may be smarter than a fifth grader, but are you applying that knowledge correctly?
Think about your world in this light and you will begin to identify the areas in which you’ve been operating inefficiently. We’ll cover this topic in greater detail in the days to come…
Gregory Hake 
Gregg, I first read this blog the other day while on a break at school and it really got my wheels turning. I love observing cycles; it’s simply fascinating to me that cycles are so inherent in everyday life and so often go by unnoticed or written-off. I’ve been trying to be more aware of my phases and cycles of life when I stumbled upon such a cool cycle today.
I recently started a job at a coffee shop with a drive-thru. Too often people are in such a hurry to get their coffee and get on with their day that they forget that there is even a human on the other end of the speaker taking their order or in the window passing off their coffee. Quite frankly, it’s a little draining to see this cycle of disregard for anything except one’s own needs. But today, there was a woman who offered to pay for coffee of the person behind her in the drive-thru line. I smiled and asked how she knew this person and she explained to me she, in fact, did not know her and that I was to tell her it was a random act of kindness and it was to be passed on. I stopped, literally taken aback, jaw dropped, so refreshed and yet so surprised it was even happening. And wouldn’t you know- the cycle continued for the 10 cars down the line.
I couldn’t help but share this awesome story! It was such a beautiful cycle and I thought it might inspire others to get a cycle of kindness started 🙂
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Thank you for your comment and story! Very encouraging!
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I think of the countless times I have thought (after the fact) if only I had known…I would have acted differently. Looking back it was my transitions that could have been more graceful. But more than that; what did I spoil because of my ineptness? As I think of it, I’m always in transition as change is a constant, so just reacting through life is not an option, it is meant to be consciously lived. Thanks for this post.
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Appreciate the post topics over the past few days . . . very helpful! Thanks!
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Interesting to think of overall cycles in phases from birth to adulthood. Just as you wouldn’t want to thwart your own child’s development in each stage, I think it should go without saying that we wouldn’t want to similarly thwart any developmental phase of a cycle. Good food for thought – thanks!
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Eager to participate in this process!!!
Shoring up the inefficient areas in my life is an exciting prospect! Seeing things in a new light and consciously engaging in heightening my awareness with respect to where I’m at, why I’m here and where I’m going sounds like a new challenge to me, and a fun one!!!!
Thanks for this perfectly time’d post.
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My pleasure…
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According to the game show, most of the time I’m not smarter than a 5th grader 🙂 Perhaps with a little more awareness I can quickly catch up and handle the cycles at hand to greater success. Have a great one!
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Nice photo! Did you take that yourself?
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Sure did. Lake Lanier, from 2,000 feet, with my iPhone. Glad you liked it!
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My next question was going to be where it was taken. Beautiful lake.
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Great start to the day & excellent question to consider – am I handling this phase wisely!
?!!
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A perfect time to check and test for any assumptions that might be limiting forward movement!
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This post really caused me to consider where the different cycles are at in my life. You really do have to treat things differently when they are in a different part of the process. I will aim to be more conscious of the various cycles in my life, and with a little application of wisdom, hopefully I will be able to handle them better than if I was moving through life unaware. Thanks!
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There is so much to consider with this topic. The more I think about it, the more there is to it – large cycles, small cycles, the cycles you are in personally along with those of every other person at so many different levels.
The first step, I imagine, would to start to become aware of the most obvious cycles, consider them and work with them. From there, it seems you’d become aware of things that were less obvious and start to see what before was hidden to you.
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Awareness to our life and the world around us, a great place to start coming off this Holiday weekend.
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