Change, no matter how premeditated or desired, is always unsettling. Watching the sun go down on the last day of life as you knew it. It used to seem so simple. Things were here and then they weren’t. Decisions were made and weren’t sweated. We hadn’t yet developed enough neuroses to understand the complexities that intermingled as we dabbled in our lives. 

And yet it all worked out. Preparations weren’t made, plans weren’t checked, thoughts weren’t second guessed. It was simply executed and the rest was white noise. Time has weathered the joints of my good nature. I feel the creaks in my soul as the pieces of my life shift. I mourn them. I cling desperately to the comfort my weary heart has found. I cry and I resist and I flail. My heart breaks for the world I was so ready to abandon.

But if there is one quality of time that is equally a benefit and a detractor, it’s that it moves you forward with or without your permission. The sun will rise on a new day that brings a new life. Change will come. And you will get through it. Your anxious bones will settle, your fleeting heart will perch. Your soul will roost in a warm, dry place. And you will find comfort again. 

Feel every piece of it. Embrace it, love it, hate it, deny it. Be the very thing you are called to be and honor it. To feel the seriousness of a thing is to walk with awareness and intention. There are reasons for our little fissions. Collect them and carry them with you. Visit them and let them remind you of all that you’ve left behind, and of what you’ve chosen intentionally to carry forth.

Let changes make you wriggle in your skin and pace inside your mind. But never let it stop you dead. Never let it cause you to fail to meet what calls you. You may never stop being afraid, and that’s alright so long as you do not stop. Do it afraid.