Navigating a series of unexpected events?

Have you found yourself navigating a series of unexpected events? Sometimes even a single unexpected event can have wide-reaching implications in our lives. We often find ourselves navigating change in the middle adulthood phase.

When life stacks up challenges, we’re often very good at reacting to the curveballs. We need to adapt to change, often quickly, but we also need to allow room to assess the longer term impacts to our lives.

Here are a few thoughts on how we could both react fast and implement slow and steady change that helps us become the people we want to be.

First, we rely on what we know to be true

We send up a prayer and grit our way through. We know that obstacles are part of any life. We’ve been taught that God won’t give us more than we can handle.

We respect this and we’re confident with God’s grace we’ll get through whatever we face. So we pause to ask for strength and wisdom, then roll up our sleeves to tackle the challenges.

We value character traits such as patience, resilience, unselfishness and overcoming obstacles. And we, women of grit and grace, are adept at navigating, adapting, serving and “carrying on” despite the events that threaten to overcome.

We reach out to others

It’s important to reach out to others in so many ways. We need others who’ve walked this path for their knowledge and guidance as we face our challenges. We need to work hard, have a smart plan, and trust God.

This week alone, I’ve heard from a friend diagnosed with cancer, another juggling care of her husband with dementia while managing a remodel to make their lives easier, and others with various family illnesses and emergencies. These brave women march forward, armed with prayers and support from family and friends, and confident that God does indeed walk with us through every valley.

We do what we can to navigate these changes as gracefully as we can.

And then we need to pause to evaluate

Sometimes we don’t realize we are off course. Worse yet, we can get caught in a trap of feeling we need to take on added challenges without reassessing. We’re confident that if we trust God more, or work harder, or faster, or become more efficient we will get beyond these new challenges.

This year, I’ve felt the call to slow down, to celebrate small beginnings, and to acknowledge the gentle, easy growth that comes from knowing deep inside who I am and who I want to become.

We benefit from slowing down

The military motto “slow is smooth and smooth is fast,” designed to build a capacity for deep learned behavior that helps a team adapt quickly. Essentially, forming solid habits helps a unit move strategically under stress.

Whoa, doesn’t that sound like what a modern woman needs? The capacity to utilize deep habits to move forward strategically under stress?

I’m still discovering this version of Elaine, the one of the future. But I’m also coming to realize that she’s less elusive than I once thought.

We come back to ourselves

The saying “wherever you go, there you are” reminds us that we retain our identity despite our situation. The word identity has Latin roots and literally means our repeated and essential way of being.

How we react to change defines us. The choices we make repeatedly create shifts in our identity. In Atomic Habits, James Clear goes so far as to say:

“The effect of one-off experiences tends to fade away while the effect of habits gets reinforced with time, which means your habits contribute most of the evidence that shapes your identity. In this way, the process of building habits is actually the process of becoming yourself.”

Good habits help us with effectively navigating unexpected events

Building strong habits for managing change helps us stay on course with who we are and want to be. Many of us have learned that taking care of ourselves helps us navigate more strategically so that we’re better able to serve those in our path.

I had an important and clarifying conversation with a dear mentor of mine recently, commenting on the article Put yourself first. She pointed out that Jesus gave continually and that each time he healed, “power went out of Him.”  But the needle on the power gauge never hit empty. The key point is that we’re not putting ourselves first for selfish reasons. We’re taking care of ourselves because we do our best when our tanks have fuel.

So what are your habits with regard to change?

Do you barrel through? Or do your rely on deeply formed habits that are true to who you are? As I think about habits we can cultivate as we go through stressful periods, a few come to mind:

• Prayer
• Journaling (especially reflecting on who I am and what I’m learning)
• Connecting with others who’ve navigated similar paths or are reliable sounding boards
• Grounding myself in nature (walks, sitting outside, taking photographs)
• Reading or listening to experts on relevant topics

As we look forward to who we’re becoming, remember that pausing to reflect is an important aspect of transitioning through change or stepping into a new season.