initiations

We often describe the process of becoming someone as “personal growth,” but it may be more accurate to say that we develop in stages or phases that are marked by initiations. Emerson calls them “ascensions of state.” There may be long phases and short ones, sometimes overlapping and simultaneous. Each initiation might well be a challenge, and, from one to the next, we may feel that we have entered a different state. Our task is to deal with these initiations effectively, knowing that each one will take us to a new level of vitality. An initiation entails a liminal time when we are neither back in familiar territory or secure in a new one. Therefore, passages demand that we know how to live through liminality, the in-between time. Life phases may focus on work, relationships, place, age, education, or even some other area of experience.